Symbolic, identity and probe delayed matching of sounds by the bottlenosed dolphin - Herman, L. M. and Thompson, R. K. R.
©1982 Psychonomic Society, Inc.
The short term memory for sounds of the bottlenosed dolphin was tested using symbolic identity and probe forms of the delayed matching to sample (DMS) task. The forms differed in the number (one or two) or nature (symbolic or identity matches of sample sounds) of postdelay test stimuli available as memory retrieval cues. Although symbolic DMS was difficult to learn, the final performance level was approximately equal to that for identity or probe DMS. On all tasks, the dolphin’s responses were above 80% correct through to delays of 90 sec and, in some cases, through to delays of 180 and 240 sec, the ‘limits’ being governed mainly by the dolphin’s reluctance to continue being tested at long delays. Encoding of sample stimuli into their learned symbolic representation was hypothesized to have reduced symbolic DMS to a recognition memory task, resulting in the observed equivalence of performance with the other two showed no significant proactive interference effects from samples of prior trials. Instead, proactive interference was traceable to the probe value of the prior trial. Overall, the auditory DMS data for the dolphin were functionally similar to results reported for monkeys tested on symbolic, identity and probe visual DMS tasks.
Herman, L. M. and Thompson, R. K. R. (1982) Symbolic, identity, and probe delayed matching of sounds by the bottlenosed dolphin. Animal Learning and Behavior, 10, 22-34
Back to Top Dolphin Programs | Whale Programs | Education Programs | Our Research | Resource Guide Copyright © 2002, The Dolphin Institute |
