title: Five on one side: personal and social information in spatial choice.
abstract: To examine whether the outcome of a rat's own choices ("personal information") and the choice behavior of another rat ("social information") can jointly control spatial choices, rats were tested in an open field task in which they searched for food. For the rats of primary interest (Subject Rats), the baited locations were all on one side of the arena, but the specific locations baited and the side on which they occurred varied over trials. The Subject Rats were sometimes tested together with an informed "Model" rat that had learned to find food in the same five locations (all on the same side of the arena) on every trial. Unintended perceptual cues apparently controlled spatial choices at first, but when perceptual cues to food location were not available, choices were controlled by both personal information (allowing the baited side of the arena to be determined) and social information (allowing baited locations to be determined more precisely). This shows that control by personal and social information are not mutually exclusive and supports the view that these two kinds of information can be used flexibly and adaptively to guide spatial choices. This article is part of a Special Issue entitled: tribute to Tom Zentall.
authors.affiliation: Department of Psychology, Villanova University, 800 E. Lancaster Ave., Villanova, PA 19085, USA. Electronic address: michael.brown@villanova.edu.
authors.forename: Michael F
authors.initials: MF
authors.lastname: Brown
authors.affiliation: Department of Psychology, Villanova University, 800 E. Lancaster Ave., Villanova, PA 19085, USA.
authors.forename: Marie E
authors.initials: ME
authors.lastname: Saxon
authors.affiliation: Department of Psychology, Villanova University, 800 E. Lancaster Ave., Villanova, PA 19085, USA.
authors.forename: Teagan
authors.initials: T
authors.lastname: Bisbing
authors.affiliation: Department of Psychology, Villanova University, 800 E. Lancaster Ave., Villanova, PA 19085, USA.
authors.forename: Jessica
authors.initials: J
authors.lastname: Evans
authors.affiliation: Department of Psychology, Villanova University, 800 E. Lancaster Ave., Villanova, PA 19085, USA.
authors.forename: Jennifer
authors.initials: J
authors.lastname: Ruff
authors.affiliation: Department of Psychology, Villanova University, 800 E. Lancaster Ave., Villanova, PA 19085, USA.
authors.forename: Andrew
authors.initials: A
authors.lastname: Stokesbury
mesh_terms: D000818:Animals; D001070:Appetitive Behavior; D002755:Choice Behavior; D007100:Imitative Behavior; D008297:Male; D051381:Rats; D013028:Space Perception
keywords: Personal information; Social cognition; Spatial cognition; Spatial cues