Hemispheric memories for the content and position of food caches in the domestic chick.
From Day 2 to Day 4 of life, chicks were fed daily in a large enclosure with 2 identical food caches, each filled with a different type of seed. On Day 5, binocular and monocular chicks were fed in their home cages 1 type of seed exclusively for 30 min. At test, soon after this devaluation phase, both binocular and right-eyed chicks chose the food caches containing the seeds that had not been devalued; in contrast, left-eyed chicks did not show a clear choice. Experiments revealed that the asymmetry was not due to lack of motivation, worse spatial memory, or inability to remember the consequences of devaluation by left-eyed chicks. Results suggest that young chicks can form declarative-like memories of the content of food caches. However, chicks using their left eye (which provides a supply mainly to the right hemisphere) failed to integrate memory of the content of food caches with memory of the consequences of devaluation.
Cozzutti
C
C
Department of General Psychology, University of Padova, Italy.
Vallortigara
G
G
D000367:Age Factors; D000818:Animals; D001070:Appetitive Behavior / Q000502:physiology*; D002645:Chickens / Q000502:physiology*; D004292:Dominance, Cerebral / Q000502:physiology*; D011939:Mental Recall / Q000502:physiology*; D009897:Optic Chiasm / Q000502:physiology*; D009949:Orientation / Q000502:physiology*; D012683:Sensory Deprivation; D015348:Vision, Binocular / Q000502:physiology; D015349:Vision, Monocular / Q000502:physiology*; D014795:Visual Pathways / Q000502:physiology