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Bumblebees exhibit the memory spacing effect
- Source :
- Toda, NRT; Song, J; & Nieh, JC. (2009). Bumblebees exhibit the memory spacing effect. Naturwissenschaften, 96(10), 1185-1191. doi: 10.1007/s00114-009-0582-1. UC San Diego: Retrieved from: http://www.escholarship.org/uc/item/4qm2z2qj, Die Naturwissenschaften, Toda, Nicholas R.; Song, Jeremy; & Nieh, James C.(2009). Bumblebees exhibit the memory spacing effect. Naturwissenschaften: The Science of Nature, 96(10), pp 1185-1191. doi: 10.1007/s00114-009-0582-1. Retrieved from: http://www.escholarship.org/uc/item/373422ps
- Publisher :
- Springer Nature
-
Abstract
- Associative learning is key to how bees recognize and return to rewarding floral resources. It thus plays a major role in pollinator floral constancy and plant gene flow. Honeybees are the primary model for pollinator associative learning, but bumblebees play an important ecological role in a wider range of habitats, and their associative learning abilities are less well understood. We assayed learning with the proboscis extension reflex (PER), using a novel method for restraining bees (capsules) designed to improve bumblebee learning. We present the first results demonstrating that bumblebees exhibit the memory spacing effect. They improve their associative learning of odor and nectar reward by exhibiting increased memory acquisition, a component of long-term memory formation, when the time interval between rewarding trials is increased. Bombus impatiens forager memory acquisition (average discrimination index values) improved by 129% and 65% at inter-trial intervals (ITI) of 5 and 3 min, respectively, as compared to an ITI of 1 min. Memory acquisition rate also increased with increasing ITI. Encapsulation significantly increases olfactory memory acquisition. Ten times more foragers exhibited at least one PER response during training in capsules as compared to traditional PER harnesses. Thus, a novel conditioning assay, encapsulation, enabled us to improve bumblebee-learning acquisition and demonstrate that spaced learning results in better memory consolidation. Such spaced learning likely plays a role in forming long-term memories of rewarding floral resources. © 2009 Springer-Verlag.
- Subjects :
- 0106 biological sciences
Trial spacing effect
Plant Nectar
Bumblebees
Olfactory conditioning
Flowers
Models, Biological
010603 evolutionary biology
01 natural sciences
Proboscis extension reflex
Bombus impatiens
Discrimination Learning
Memory spacing effect
Reward
Memory
Associative learning
Animals
0501 psychology and cognitive sciences
050102 behavioral science & comparative psychology
Discrimination learning
Olfactory memory
Pollination
Bumblebee
Ecology, Evolution, Behavior and Systematics
Life Sciences, general
Analysis of Variance
Original Paper
biology
Spacing effect
05 social sciences
Environment, general
Life Sciences
Association Learning
General Medicine
Bees
biology.organism_classification
Classical conditioning
Space Perception
Memory consolidation
Cognitive psychology
Subjects
Details
- Language :
- English
- ISSN :
- 00281042
- Volume :
- 96
- Issue :
- 10
- Database :
- OpenAIRE
- Journal :
- Naturwissenschaften
- Accession number :
- edsair.doi.dedup.....d026630ee1a5479228da38399d30ef66
- Full Text :
- https://doi.org/10.1007/s00114-009-0582-1