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Volotsky S, Donchin O, Segev R. The archerfish uses motor adaptation in shooting to correct for changing physical conditions. eLife 2024; 12:RP92909. [PMID: 38829209 PMCID: PMC11147504 DOI: 10.7554/elife.92909] [Citation(s) in RCA: 0] [Impact Index Per Article: 0] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Key Words] [MESH Headings] [Grants] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Indexed: 06/05/2024] Open
Abstract
The archerfish is unique in its ability to hunt by shooting a jet of water from its mouth that hits insects situated above the water's surface. To aim accurately, the fish needs to overcome physical factors including changes in light refraction at the air-water interface. Nevertheless, archerfish can still hit the target with a high success rate under changing conditions. One possible explanation for this extraordinary ability is that it is learned by trial and error through a motor adaptation process. We tested this possibility by characterizing the ability of the archerfish to adapt to perturbations in the environment to make appropriate adjustments to its shots. We introduced a perturbing airflow above the water tank of the archerfish trained to shoot at a target. For each trial shot, we measured the error, i.e., the distance between the center of the target and the center of the water jet produced by the fish. Immediately after the airflow perturbation, there was an increase in shot error. Then, over the course of several trials, the error was reduced and eventually plateaued. After the removal of the perturbation, there was an aftereffect, where the error was in the opposite direction but washed out after several trials. These results indicate that archerfish can adapt to the airflow perturbation. Testing the fish with two opposite airflow directions indicated that adaptation took place within an egocentric frame of reference. These results thus suggest that the archerfish is capable of motor adaptation, as indicated by data showing that the fish produced motor commands that anticipated the perturbation.
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Affiliation(s)
- Svetlana Volotsky
- Department of Biomedical Engineering, Ben-Gurion University of the NegevBe'er ShevaIsrael
- School of Brain Sciences and Cognition, Ben-Gurion University of the NegevBe'er ShevaIsrael
- Department of Life Sciences, Ben-Gurion University of the NegevBe'er ShevaIsrael
| | - Opher Donchin
- Department of Biomedical Engineering, Ben-Gurion University of the NegevBe'er ShevaIsrael
- School of Brain Sciences and Cognition, Ben-Gurion University of the NegevBe'er ShevaIsrael
| | - Ronen Segev
- Department of Biomedical Engineering, Ben-Gurion University of the NegevBe'er ShevaIsrael
- School of Brain Sciences and Cognition, Ben-Gurion University of the NegevBe'er ShevaIsrael
- Department of Life Sciences, Ben-Gurion University of the NegevBe'er ShevaIsrael
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2
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Seidel Malkinson T, Bayle DJ, Kaufmann BC, Liu J, Bourgeois A, Lehongre K, Fernandez-Vidal S, Navarro V, Lambrecq V, Adam C, Margulies DS, Sitt JD, Bartolomeo P. Intracortical recordings reveal vision-to-action cortical gradients driving human exogenous attention. Nat Commun 2024; 15:2586. [PMID: 38531880 DOI: 10.1038/s41467-024-46013-4] [Citation(s) in RCA: 0] [Impact Index Per Article: 0] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Grants] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 06/15/2022] [Accepted: 02/09/2024] [Indexed: 03/28/2024] Open
Abstract
Exogenous attention, the process that makes external salient stimuli pop-out of a visual scene, is essential for survival. How attention-capturing events modulate human brain processing remains unclear. Here we show how the psychological construct of exogenous attention gradually emerges over large-scale gradients in the human cortex, by analyzing activity from 1,403 intracortical contacts implanted in 28 individuals, while they performed an exogenous attention task. The timing, location and task-relevance of attentional events defined a spatiotemporal gradient of three neural clusters, which mapped onto cortical gradients and presented a hierarchy of timescales. Visual attributes modulated neural activity at one end of the gradient, while at the other end it reflected the upcoming response timing, with attentional effects occurring at the intersection of visual and response signals. These findings challenge multi-step models of attention, and suggest that frontoparietal networks, which process sequential stimuli as separate events sharing the same location, drive exogenous attention phenomena such as inhibition of return.
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Affiliation(s)
- Tal Seidel Malkinson
- Sorbonne Université, Inserm UMRS 1127, CNRS UMR 7225, Paris Brain Institute, ICM, Hôpital de la Pitié-Salpêtrière, 75013, Paris, France.
- Université de Lorraine, CNRS, IMoPA, F-54000, Nancy, France.
| | - Dimitri J Bayle
- Licae Lab, Université Paris Ouest-La Défense, 92000, Nanterre, France
| | - Brigitte C Kaufmann
- Sorbonne Université, Inserm UMRS 1127, CNRS UMR 7225, Paris Brain Institute, ICM, Hôpital de la Pitié-Salpêtrière, 75013, Paris, France
| | - Jianghao Liu
- Sorbonne Université, Inserm UMRS 1127, CNRS UMR 7225, Paris Brain Institute, ICM, Hôpital de la Pitié-Salpêtrière, 75013, Paris, France
- Dassault Systèmes, Vélizy-Villacoublay, France
| | - Alexia Bourgeois
- Laboratory of Cognitive Neurorehabilitation, Faculty of Medicine, University of Geneva, 1206, Geneva, Switzerland
| | - Katia Lehongre
- CENIR - Centre de Neuro-Imagerie de Recherche, Paris Brain Institute, ICM, Hôpital de la Pitié-Salpêtrière, 75013, Paris, France
| | - Sara Fernandez-Vidal
- CENIR - Centre de Neuro-Imagerie de Recherche, Paris Brain Institute, ICM, Hôpital de la Pitié-Salpêtrière, 75013, Paris, France
| | - Vincent Navarro
- Sorbonne Université, Inserm UMRS 1127, CNRS UMR 7225, Paris Brain Institute, ICM, Hôpital de la Pitié-Salpêtrière, 75013, Paris, France
- AP-HP, Epilepsy and EEG Units, Pitié-Salpêtrière Hospital, 75013, Paris, France
- Reference center of rare epilepsies, EpiCare, Pitié-Salpêtrière Hospital, 75013, Paris, France
| | - Virginie Lambrecq
- Sorbonne Université, Inserm UMRS 1127, CNRS UMR 7225, Paris Brain Institute, ICM, Hôpital de la Pitié-Salpêtrière, 75013, Paris, France
- AP-HP, Epilepsy and EEG Units, Pitié-Salpêtrière Hospital, 75013, Paris, France
- Reference center of rare epilepsies, EpiCare, Pitié-Salpêtrière Hospital, 75013, Paris, France
| | - Claude Adam
- Sorbonne Université, Inserm UMRS 1127, CNRS UMR 7225, Paris Brain Institute, ICM, Hôpital de la Pitié-Salpêtrière, 75013, Paris, France
- AP-HP, Epilepsy and EEG Units, Pitié-Salpêtrière Hospital, 75013, Paris, France
- Reference center of rare epilepsies, EpiCare, Pitié-Salpêtrière Hospital, 75013, Paris, France
| | - Daniel S Margulies
- Laboratoire INCC, équipe Perception, Action, Cognition, Université de Paris, 75005, Paris, France
| | - Jacobo D Sitt
- Sorbonne Université, Inserm UMRS 1127, CNRS UMR 7225, Paris Brain Institute, ICM, Hôpital de la Pitié-Salpêtrière, 75013, Paris, France
| | - Paolo Bartolomeo
- Sorbonne Université, Inserm UMRS 1127, CNRS UMR 7225, Paris Brain Institute, ICM, Hôpital de la Pitié-Salpêtrière, 75013, Paris, France
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3
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Nafcha O, Vilker D, Shamay-Tsoory S, Gabay S. Prosocial behavior in competitive fish: the case of the archerfish. Commun Biol 2023; 6:822. [PMID: 37553518 PMCID: PMC10409803 DOI: 10.1038/s42003-023-05195-1] [Citation(s) in RCA: 0] [Impact Index Per Article: 0] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Key Words] [MESH Headings] [Grants] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 02/16/2022] [Accepted: 07/31/2023] [Indexed: 08/10/2023] Open
Abstract
Humans are social creatures, demonstrate prosocial behaviors, and are sensitive to the actions and consequent payoff of others. This social sensitivity has also been found in many other species, though not in all. Research has suggested that prosocial tendencies are more pronounced in naturally cooperative species whose social structure requires a high level of interdependence and allomaternal care. The present study challenges this assumption by demonstrating, in a laboratory setting, that archerfish, competitive by nature, preferred targets rewarding both themselves and their tankmates, but only when the payoff was equal. With no tankmate on the other side of the partition, they exhibited no obvious preference. Finding evidence for prosocial behavior and negative responses to unequal distribution of reward to the advantage of the other fish suggests that in a competitive social environment, being prosocial may be the most adaptive strategy for personal survival, even if it benefits others as well.
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Affiliation(s)
- Orit Nafcha
- School of Psychological Science, University of Haifa, Haifa, Israel.
- The Institute of Information Processing and Decision Making (IIPDM), Haifa, Israel.
| | - Dana Vilker
- School of Psychological Science, University of Haifa, Haifa, Israel
- The Institute of Information Processing and Decision Making (IIPDM), Haifa, Israel
| | | | - Shai Gabay
- School of Psychological Science, University of Haifa, Haifa, Israel
- The Institute of Information Processing and Decision Making (IIPDM), Haifa, Israel
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4
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Posner MI. The Evolution and Future Development of Attention Networks. J Intell 2023; 11:98. [PMID: 37367500 DOI: 10.3390/jintelligence11060098] [Citation(s) in RCA: 0] [Impact Index Per Article: 0] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Key Words] [Grants] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 02/08/2023] [Revised: 05/05/2023] [Accepted: 05/18/2023] [Indexed: 06/28/2023] Open
Abstract
The goal of this paper is to examine how the development of attention networks has left many important issues unsolved and to propose possible directions for solving them by combining human and animal studies. The paper starts with evidence from citation mapping that indicates attention has played a central role in integrating cognitive and neural studies into Cognitive Neuroscience. The integration of the fields depends in part upon similarities and differences in performance over a wide variety of animals. In the case of exogenous orienting of attention primates, rodents and humans are quite similar, but this is not so with executive control. In humans, attention networks continue to develop at different rates during infancy and childhood and into adulthood. From age four on, the Attention Network Test (ANT) allows measurement of individual differences in the alerting, orienting and executive networks. Overt and covert orienting do overlap in their anatomy, but there is evidence of some degree of functional independence at the cellular level. The attention networks frequently work together with sensory, memory and other networks. Integration of animal and human studies may be advanced by examining common genes involved in individual attention networks or their integration with other brain networks. Attention networks involve widely scattered computation nodes in different brain areas, both cortical and subcortical. Future studies need to attend to the white matter that connects them and the direction of information flow during task performance.
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Affiliation(s)
- Michael I Posner
- Department of Psychology, Institute of Neuroscience, University of Oregon, Eugene, OR 97403, USA
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5
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Earl B. Humans, fish, spiders and bees inherited working memory and attention from their last common ancestor. Front Psychol 2023; 13:937712. [PMID: 36814887 PMCID: PMC9939904 DOI: 10.3389/fpsyg.2022.937712] [Citation(s) in RCA: 0] [Impact Index Per Article: 0] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Key Words] [Track Full Text] [Figures] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 05/06/2022] [Accepted: 11/11/2022] [Indexed: 02/08/2023] Open
Abstract
All brain processes that generate behaviour, apart from reflexes, operate with information that is in an "activated" state. This activated information, which is known as working memory (WM), is generated by the effect of attentional processes on incoming information or information previously stored in short-term or long-term memory (STM or LTM). Information in WM tends to remain the focus of attention; and WM, attention and STM together enable information to be available to mental processes and the behaviours that follow on from them. WM and attention underpin all flexible mental processes, such as solving problems, making choices, preparing for opportunities or threats that could be nearby, or simply finding the way home. Neither WM nor attention are necessarily conscious, and both may have evolved long before consciousness. WM and attention, with similar properties, are possessed by humans, archerfish, and other vertebrates; jumping spiders, honey bees, and other arthropods; and members of other clades, whose last common ancestor (LCA) is believed to have lived more than 600 million years ago. It has been reported that very similar genes control the development of vertebrate and arthropod brains, and were likely inherited from their LCA. Genes that control brain development are conserved because brains generate adaptive behaviour. However, the neural processes that generate behaviour operate with the activated information in WM, so WM and attention must have existed prior to the evolution of brains. It is proposed that WM and attention are widespread amongst animal species because they are phylogenetically conserved mechanisms that are essential to all mental processing, and were inherited from the LCA of vertebrates, arthropods, and some other animal clades.
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6
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Dung L. Assessing tests of animal consciousness. Conscious Cogn 2022; 105:103410. [PMID: 36115312 DOI: 10.1016/j.concog.2022.103410] [Citation(s) in RCA: 0] [Impact Index Per Article: 0] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Key Words] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 05/23/2022] [Revised: 08/10/2022] [Accepted: 08/25/2022] [Indexed: 01/27/2023]
Abstract
Which animals have conscious experiences? Many different, diverse and unrelated behaviors and cognitive capacities have been proposed as tests of the presence of consciousness in an animal. It is unclear which of these tests, if any, are valid. To remedy this problem, I develop a list consisting of eight desiderata which can be used to assess putative tests of animal consciousness. These desiderata are based either on detailed analogies between consciousness-linked human behavior and non-human behavior, on theories of consciousness or on methods from human consciousness science. If a test or set of tests satisfies more of these desiderata, passing it provides stronger evidence of consciousness. Moreover, one can design future tests of animal consciousness with the intention of satisfying these desiderata to ensure their evidential strength.
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Affiliation(s)
- Leonard Dung
- Institute of Philosophy II, Ruhr-University Bochum, 44801 Bochum, Germany.
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7
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Nieder A. In search for consciousness in animals: Using working memory and voluntary attention as behavioral indicators. Neurosci Biobehav Rev 2022; 142:104865. [PMID: 36096205 DOI: 10.1016/j.neubiorev.2022.104865] [Citation(s) in RCA: 9] [Impact Index Per Article: 4.5] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Key Words] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 06/26/2022] [Revised: 08/17/2022] [Accepted: 09/05/2022] [Indexed: 10/31/2022]
Abstract
Whether animals have subjective experiences about the content of their sensory input, i.e., whether they are aware of stimuli, is a notoriously difficult question to answer. If consciousness is present in animals, it must share fundamental characteristics with human awareness. Working memory and voluntary/endogenous attention are suggested as diagnostic features of conscious awareness. Behavioral evidence shows clear signatures of both working memory and voluntary attention as minimal criterium for sensory consciousness in mammals and birds. In contrast, reptiles and amphibians show no sign of either working memory or volitional attention. Surprisingly, some species of teleost fishes exhibit elementary working memory and voluntary attention effects suggestive of possibly rudimentary forms of subjective experience. With the potential exception of honeybees, evidence for conscious processing is lacking in invertebrates. These findings suggest that consciousness is not ubiquitous in the animal kingdom but also not exclusive to humans. The phylogenetic gap between animal taxa argues that evolution does not rely on specific neural substrates to endow distantly related species with basic forms of consciousness.
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Affiliation(s)
- Andreas Nieder
- Animal Physiology Unit, Institute of Neurobiology, University of Tübingen, Auf der Morgenstelle 28, 72076 Tübingen, Germany.
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8
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Lev-Ari T, Beeri H, Gutfreund Y. The Ecological View of Selective Attention. Front Integr Neurosci 2022; 16:856207. [PMID: 35391754 PMCID: PMC8979825 DOI: 10.3389/fnint.2022.856207] [Citation(s) in RCA: 4] [Impact Index Per Article: 2.0] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Key Words] [Track Full Text] [Download PDF] [Figures] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 01/16/2022] [Accepted: 02/24/2022] [Indexed: 11/16/2022] Open
Abstract
Accumulating evidence is supporting the hypothesis that our selective attention is a manifestation of mechanisms that evolved early in evolution and are shared by many organisms from different taxa. This surge of new data calls for the re-examination of our notions about attention, which have been dominated mostly by human psychology. Here, we present an hypothesis that challenges, based on evolutionary grounds, a common view of attention as a means to manage limited brain resources. We begin by arguing that evolutionary considerations do not favor the basic proposition of the limited brain resources view of attention, namely, that the capacity of the sensory organs to provide information exceeds the capacity of the brain to process this information. Moreover, physiological studies in animals and humans show that mechanisms of selective attention are highly demanding of brain resources, making it paradoxical to see attention as a means to release brain resources. Next, we build on the above arguments to address the question why attention evolved in evolution. We hypothesize that, to a certain extent, limiting sensory processing is adaptive irrespective of brain capacity. We call this hypothesis the ecological view of attention (EVA) because it is centered on interactions of an animal with its environment rather than on internal brain resources. In its essence is the notion that inherently noisy and degraded sensory inputs serve the animal’s adaptive, dynamic interactions with its environment. Attention primarily functions to resolve behavioral conflicts and false distractions. Hence, we evolved to focus on a particular target at the expense of others, not because of internal limitations, but to ensure that behavior is properly oriented and committed to its goals. Here, we expand on this notion and review evidence supporting it. We show how common results in human psychophysics and physiology can be reconciled with an EVA and discuss possible implications of the notion for interpreting current results and guiding future research.
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Affiliation(s)
- Tidhar Lev-Ari
- The Ruth and Bruce Rappaport Faculty of Medicine and Research Institute, The Technion, Haifa, Israel
| | - Hadar Beeri
- The Ruth and Bruce Rappaport Faculty of Medicine and Research Institute, The Technion, Haifa, Israel
| | - Yoram Gutfreund
- The Ruth and Bruce Rappaport Faculty of Medicine and Research Institute, The Technion, Haifa, Israel
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9
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Volotsky S, Ben-Shahar O, Donchin O, Segev R. Recognition of natural objects in the archerfish. J Exp Biol 2022; 225:274265. [PMID: 35142811 PMCID: PMC8918800 DOI: 10.1242/jeb.243237] [Citation(s) in RCA: 1] [Impact Index Per Article: 0.5] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Key Words] [Track Full Text] [Figures] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 07/26/2021] [Accepted: 01/13/2022] [Indexed: 11/20/2022]
Abstract
Recognition of individual objects and their categorization is a complex computational task. Nevertheless, visual systems can perform this task in a rapid and accurate manner. Humans and other animals can efficiently recognize objects despite countless variations in their projection on the retina due to different viewing angles, distance, illumination conditions and other parameters. To gain a better understanding of the recognition process in teleosts, we explored it in archerfish, a species that hunts by shooting a jet of water at aerial targets and thus can benefit from ecologically relevant recognition of natural objects. We found that archerfish not only can categorize objects into relevant classes but also can do so for novel objects, and additionally they can recognize an individual object presented under different conditions. To understand the mechanisms underlying this capability, we developed a computational model based on object features and a machine learning classifier. The analysis of the model revealed that a small number of features was sufficient for categorization, and the fish were more sensitive to object contours than textures. We tested these predictions in additional behavioral experiments and validated them. Our findings suggest the existence of a complex visual process in the archerfish visual system that enables object recognition and categorization. Highlighted Article: Archerfish are capable of natural object recognition and categorization based on a small number of visual features.
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Affiliation(s)
- Svetlana Volotsky
- Department of Biomedical Engineering, Ben-Gurion University of the Negev, Be'er Sheva, 8410501, Israel.,Zlotowski Center for Neuroscience, Ben-Gurion University of the Negev, Be'er Sheva, 8410501, Israel
| | - Ohad Ben-Shahar
- Zlotowski Center for Neuroscience, Ben-Gurion University of the Negev, Be'er Sheva, 8410501, Israel.,Department of Computer Science, Ben-Gurion University of the Negev, Be'er Sheva, 8410501, Israel
| | - Opher Donchin
- Zlotowski Center for Neuroscience, Ben-Gurion University of the Negev, Be'er Sheva, 8410501, Israel.,Department of Life Sciences, Ben-Gurion University of the Negev, Be'er Sheva, 8410501, Israel
| | - Ronen Segev
- Department of Biomedical Engineering, Ben-Gurion University of the Negev, Be'er Sheva, 8410501, Israel.,Zlotowski Center for Neuroscience, Ben-Gurion University of the Negev, Be'er Sheva, 8410501, Israel.,Department of Life Sciences, Ben-Gurion University of the Negev, Be'er Sheva, 8410501, Israel
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10
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Goldstein S, Wang L, McAlonan K, Torres-Cruz M, Krauzlis RJ. Stimulus-driven visual attention in mice. J Vis 2022; 22:11. [PMID: 35044435 PMCID: PMC8787543 DOI: 10.1167/jov.22.1.11] [Citation(s) in RCA: 2] [Impact Index Per Article: 1.0] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Key Words] [MESH Headings] [Grants] [Track Full Text] [Download PDF] [Figures] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 05/16/2021] [Accepted: 12/11/2021] [Indexed: 11/30/2022] Open
Abstract
In primates, stimulus-driven changes in visual attention can facilitate or hinder perceptual performance, depending on the location and timing of the stimulus event. Mice have emerged as a powerful model for studying visual circuits and behavior; however, it is unclear whether mice show similar interactions between stimulus events and visual attention during perceptual decisions. To investigate this, we trained head-fixed mice to detect a near-threshold change in visual orientation and tested how performance was altered by task-irrelevant stimuli that occurred at different times and locations with respect to the orientation change. We found that task-irrelevant stimuli strongly affected mouse performance. Specifically, stimulus-driven attention in mice followed a similar time course as that in other species: The decreases in reaction times fully emerged between 250 and 400 ms after the stimulus event, and detection accuracy was not affected. However, the effects of stimulus-driven attention on behavior in mice were insensitive to stimulus-event location, an aspect different from what is known in primates. In contrast, reaction times in mice were reduced at longer delays after the task-irrelevant stimulus event regardless of its spatial congruence to the target. These results highlight the strengths and limitations of using mice as a model for studying higher-order visual functions.
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Affiliation(s)
- Sheridan Goldstein
- Laboratory of Sensorimotor Research, National Eye Institute, Bethesda, MD, USA
| | - Lupeng Wang
- Laboratory of Sensorimotor Research, National Eye Institute, Bethesda, MD, USA
| | - Kerry McAlonan
- Laboratory of Sensorimotor Research, National Eye Institute, Bethesda, MD, USA
| | - Mateus Torres-Cruz
- Laboratory of Sensorimotor Research, National Eye Institute, Bethesda, MD, USA
- Laboratory for Neuroscience and Behavior, University of Sao Paulo, Sao Paulo, Brazil
- https://orcid.org/0000-0001-7571-0072
| | - Richard J Krauzlis
- Laboratory of Sensorimotor Research, National Eye Institute, Bethesda, MD, USA
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11
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Leibovich-Raveh T, Raveh A, Vilker D, Gabay S. Magnitude integration in the Archerfish. Sci Rep 2021; 11:15664. [PMID: 34341367 PMCID: PMC8329031 DOI: 10.1038/s41598-021-94956-1] [Citation(s) in RCA: 4] [Impact Index Per Article: 1.3] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Key Words] [Track Full Text] [Download PDF] [Figures] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 02/04/2021] [Accepted: 05/31/2021] [Indexed: 02/07/2023] Open
Abstract
We make magnitude-related decisions every day, for example, to choose the shortest queue at the grocery store. When making such decisions, which magnitudes do we consider? The dominant theory suggests that our focus is on numerical quantity, i.e., the number of items in a set. This theory leads to quantity-focused research suggesting that discriminating quantities is automatic, innate, and is the basis for mathematical abilities in humans. Another theory suggests, instead, that non-numerical magnitudes, such as the total area of the compared items, are usually what humans rely on, and numerical quantity is used only when required. Since wild animals must make quick magnitude-related decisions to eat, seek shelter, survive, and procreate, studying which magnitudes animals spontaneously use in magnitude-related decisions is a good way to study the relative primacy of numerical quantity versus non-numerical magnitudes. We asked whether, in an animal model, the influence of non-numerical magnitudes on performance in a spontaneous magnitude comparison task is modulated by the number of non-numerical magnitudes that positively correlate with numerical quantity. Our animal model was the Archerfish, a fish that, in the wild, hunts insects by shooting a jet of water at them. These fish were trained to shoot water at artificial targets presented on a computer screen above the water tank. We tested the Archerfish's performance in spontaneous, untrained two-choice magnitude decisions. We found that the fish tended to select the group containing larger non-numerical magnitudes and smaller quantities of dots. The fish selected the group containing more dots mostly when the quantity of the dots was positively correlated with all five different non-numerical magnitudes. The current study adds to the body of studies providing direct evidence that in some cases animals' magnitude-related decisions are more affected by non-numerical magnitudes than by numerical quantity, putting doubt on the claims that numerical quantity perception is the most basic building block of mathematical abilities.
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Affiliation(s)
- Tali Leibovich-Raveh
- grid.18098.380000 0004 1937 0562Department of Mathematics Education, Faculty of Education, University of Haifa, Haifa, Israel
| | - Ashael Raveh
- grid.18098.380000 0004 1937 0562The Institute of Information Processing and Decision Making and the School of Psychological Sciences, University of Haifa, Haifa, Israel ,grid.18098.380000 0004 1937 0562Department of Evolutionary and Environmental Biology, Faculty of Natural Sciences, University of Haifa, Haifa, Israel
| | - Dana Vilker
- grid.18098.380000 0004 1937 0562The Institute of Information Processing and Decision Making and the School of Psychological Sciences, University of Haifa, Haifa, Israel
| | - Shai Gabay
- grid.18098.380000 0004 1937 0562The Institute of Information Processing and Decision Making and the School of Psychological Sciences, University of Haifa, Haifa, Israel
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12
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Guzhang Y, Shelchkova N, Ezzo R, Poletti M. Transient perceptual enhancements resulting from selective shifts of exogenous attention in the central fovea. Curr Biol 2021; 31:2698-2703.e2. [PMID: 33930304 PMCID: PMC8763350 DOI: 10.1016/j.cub.2021.03.105] [Citation(s) in RCA: 2] [Impact Index Per Article: 0.7] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Key Words] [MESH Headings] [Grants] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 11/10/2020] [Revised: 03/01/2021] [Accepted: 03/31/2021] [Indexed: 12/01/2022]
Abstract
Exogenous attention, a powerful adaptive tool that quickly and involuntarily orients processing resources to salient stimuli, has traditionally been studied in the lower-resolution parafoveal and peripheral visual field.1-4 It is not known whether and how it operates across the 1° central fovea where visual resolution peaks.5,6 Here we investigated the dynamics of exogenous attention in the foveola. To circumvent the challenges posed by fixational eye movements at this scale, we used high-precision eye-tracking and gaze-contingent display control for retinal stabilization.7 High-acuity stimuli were briefly presented foveally at varying delays following an exogenous cue. Attended and unattended locations were just a few arcminutes away from the preferred locus of fixation. Our results show that for short temporal delays, observers' ability to discriminate fine detail is enhanced at the cued location. This enhancement is highly localized and does not extend to the nearby locations only 16' away. On a longer timescale, instead, we report an inverse effect: paradoxically, acuity is sharper at the unattended locations, resembling the phenomenon of inhibition of return at much larger eccentricities.8-10 Although exogenous attention represents a mechanism for low-cost monitoring of the environment in the extrafoveal space, these findings show that, in the foveola, it transiently modulates vision of detail with a high degree of resolution. Together with inhibition of return, it may aid visual exploration of complex foveal stimuli.11.
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Affiliation(s)
- Yue Guzhang
- Department of Brain and Cognitive Sciences, University of Rochester, Rochester, NY, USA
| | - Natalya Shelchkova
- Program in Computational Neuroscience, University of Chicago, Chicago, IL, USA
| | - Rania Ezzo
- Department of Psychology, New York University, New York, NY, USA
| | - Martina Poletti
- Department of Brain and Cognitive Sciences, University of Rochester, Rochester, NY, USA; Department of Neuroscience, University of Rochester, Rochester, NY, USA; Center for Visual Science, University of Rochester, Rochester, NY, USA.
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13
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Individual behavioural traits not social context affects learning about novel objects in archerfish. Behav Ecol Sociobiol 2021. [DOI: 10.1007/s00265-021-02996-4] [Citation(s) in RCA: 2] [Impact Index Per Article: 0.7] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Indexed: 11/25/2022]
Abstract
Abstract
Learning can enable rapid behavioural responses to changing conditions but can depend on the social context and behavioural phenotype of the individual. Learning rates have been linked to consistent individual differences in behavioural traits, especially in situations which require engaging with novelty, but the social environment can also play an important role. The presence of others can modulate the effects of individual behavioural traits and afford access to social information that can reduce the need for ‘risky’ asocial learning. Most studies of social effects on learning are focused on more social species; however, such factors can be important even for less-social animals, including non-grouping or facultatively social species which may still derive benefit from social conditions. Using archerfish, Toxotes chatareus, which exhibit high levels of intra-specific competition and do not show a strong preference for grouping, we explored the effect of social contexts on learning. Individually housed fish were assayed in an ‘open-field’ test and then trained to criterion in a task where fish learnt to shoot a novel cue for a food reward—with a conspecific neighbour visible either during training, outside of training or never (full, partial or no visible presence). Time to learn to shoot the novel cue differed across individuals but not across social context. This suggests that social context does not have a strong effect on learning in this non-obligatory social species; instead, it further highlights the importance that inter-individual variation in behavioural traits can have on learning.
Significance statement
Some individuals learn faster than others. Many factors can affect an animal’s learning rate—for example, its behavioural phenotype may make it more or less likely to engage with novel objects. The social environment can play a big role too—affecting learning directly and modifying the effects of an individual’s traits. Effects of social context on learning mostly come from highly social species, but recent research has focused on less-social animals. Archerfish display high intra-specific competition, and our study suggests that social context has no strong effect on their learning to shoot novel objects for rewards. Our results may have some relevance for social enrichment and welfare of this increasingly studied species, suggesting there are no negative effects of short- to medium-term isolation of this species—at least with regards to behavioural performance and learning tasks.
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MaBouDi H, Barron AB, Li S, Honkanen M, Loukola OJ, Peng F, Li W, Marshall JAR, Cope A, Vasilaki E, Solvi C. Non-numerical strategies used by bees to solve numerical cognition tasks. Proc Biol Sci 2021; 288:20202711. [PMID: 33593192 PMCID: PMC7934903 DOI: 10.1098/rspb.2020.2711] [Citation(s) in RCA: 10] [Impact Index Per Article: 3.3] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Key Words] [Track Full Text] [Download PDF] [Figures] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Indexed: 12/20/2022] Open
Abstract
We examined how bees solve a visual discrimination task with stimuli commonly used in numerical cognition studies. Bees performed well on the task, but additional tests showed that they had learned continuous (non-numerical) cues. A network model using biologically plausible visual feature filtering and a simple associative rule was capable of learning the task using only continuous cues inherent in the training stimuli, with no numerical processing. This model was also able to reproduce behaviours that have been considered in other studies indicative of numerical cognition. Our results support the idea that a sense of magnitude may be more primitive and basic than a sense of number. Our findings highlight how problematic inadvertent continuous cues can be for studies of numerical cognition. This remains a deep issue within the field that requires increased vigilance and cleverness from the experimenter. We suggest ways of better assessing numerical cognition in non-speaking animals, including assessing the use of all alternative cues in one test, using cross-modal cues, analysing behavioural responses to detect underlying strategies, and finding the neural substrate.
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Affiliation(s)
- HaDi MaBouDi
- Department of Computer Science, University of Sheffield, Sheffield S1 4DP, UK
| | - Andrew B Barron
- Department of Computer Science, University of Sheffield, Sheffield S1 4DP, UK.,Department of Biological Sciences, Macquarie University, North Ryde, New South Wales 2109, Australia
| | - Sun Li
- Department of Psychology, School of Public Health, Southern Medical University, Guangzhou, People's Republic of China
| | - Maria Honkanen
- Ecology and Genetics Research Unit, University of Oulu, Oulu, Finland
| | - Olli J Loukola
- Ecology and Genetics Research Unit, University of Oulu, Oulu, Finland
| | - Fei Peng
- Department of Psychology, School of Public Health, Southern Medical University, Guangzhou, People's Republic of China
| | - Wenfeng Li
- Guangdong Key Laboratory of Animal Conservation and Resource Utilization, Guangdong Public Laboratory of Wild Animal Conservation and Utilization, Institute of Zoology, Guangdong Academy of Science, Guangzhou, People's Republic of China
| | - James A R Marshall
- Department of Computer Science, University of Sheffield, Sheffield S1 4DP, UK
| | - Alex Cope
- Department of Computer Science, University of Sheffield, Sheffield S1 4DP, UK
| | - Eleni Vasilaki
- Department of Computer Science, University of Sheffield, Sheffield S1 4DP, UK
| | - Cwyn Solvi
- Department of Biological Sciences, Macquarie University, North Ryde, New South Wales 2109, Australia.,School of Biological and Chemical Sciences, Queen Mary University of London, London E1 4NS, UK
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15
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Leadner K, Sekely L, Klein RM, Gabay S. Evolution of social attentional cues: Evidence from the archerfish. Cognition 2020; 207:104511. [PMID: 33203585 DOI: 10.1016/j.cognition.2020.104511] [Citation(s) in RCA: 0] [Impact Index Per Article: 0] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Key Words] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 02/06/2020] [Revised: 10/26/2020] [Accepted: 11/02/2020] [Indexed: 10/23/2022]
Abstract
Social cues such as gaze, head, and body orientation are essential for the survival of any social animal. The gaze cuing paradigm is a well-studied experimental manipulation, employed to detect automatic attentional shifts in humans. To the best of our knowledge, no previous study has tested non-primates in a paradigm that is similar to the one typically used on humans. Herein, three archerfish observed a conspecific picture oriented toward the right or the left, followed unpredictably by a visual target presented in the socially cued or un-cued location. Similar to the pattern observed in humans, fish demonstrated faster reaction times for targets presented at the socially cued location. Results suggest that social cues may have an early evolutionary origin and can elicit automatic attentional orienting even in species without a visual cortex.
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Affiliation(s)
- Keren Leadner
- Department of Psychology, University of Haifa, Haifa 3498838, Israel; The Institute of Information Processing and Decision Making, University of Haifa, Haifa 3498838, Israel.
| | - Liora Sekely
- Department of Psychology, University of Haifa, Haifa 3498838, Israel; The Institute of Information Processing and Decision Making, University of Haifa, Haifa 3498838, Israel
| | - Raymond M Klein
- Department of Psychology and Neuroscience, Dalhousie University, Halifax, Nova Scotia B3H 4R2, Canada
| | - Shai Gabay
- Department of Psychology, University of Haifa, Haifa 3498838, Israel; The Institute of Information Processing and Decision Making, University of Haifa, Haifa 3498838, Israel.
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16
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Mendelson L, Techet AH. Jumping archer fish exhibit multiple modes of fin-fin interaction. BIOINSPIRATION & BIOMIMETICS 2020; 16:016006. [PMID: 32916673 DOI: 10.1088/1748-3190/abb78e] [Citation(s) in RCA: 0] [Impact Index Per Article: 0] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Key Words] [MESH Headings] [Track Full Text] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 05/18/2020] [Accepted: 09/11/2020] [Indexed: 06/11/2023]
Abstract
Aquatic organisms jumping for aerial prey require high-performance propulsion, accurate aim, and trajectory control to succeed. Archer fish, capable of jumping up to twice their body length out of the water, address these considerations through multifaceted fin and body kinematics. In this study, we utilized 3D synthetic aperture particle image velocimetry to visualize the wakes of archer fish throughout the jumping process. We found that multiple modes of interaction between the anal and caudal fins occur during jump behaviors. Time-resolved volumetric measurements presented herein illustrate the hydrodynamics of each interaction mode in detail. Additionally, regardless of which fin uses and interactions were exhibited during a jump, we found similar relationships between the cumulative impulse of multiple propulsive vortices in the wake and the instantaneous ballistic momentum of the fish. Our results suggests that fin use may compensate for variations in individual kinematic events and in the aiming posture assumed prior to jumping and highlight how interactions between tailbeats and other fins help the archer fish reach necessary prey heights in a spatially- and visually-constrained environment. In the broader context of bioinspired propulsion, the archer fish exemplifies that multiple beneficial hydrodynamic interactions can be generated in a high-performance scenario using a single set of actuators.
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Affiliation(s)
- Leah Mendelson
- Experimental Hydrodynamics Laboratory, Department of Mechanical Engineering, Massachusetts Institute of Technology, Cambridge, MA 02139, United States of America
- Department of Engineering, Harvey Mudd College, Claremont, CA 91711, United States of America
| | - Alexandra H Techet
- Experimental Hydrodynamics Laboratory, Department of Mechanical Engineering, Massachusetts Institute of Technology, Cambridge, MA 02139, United States of America
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Abstract
The ability to visually search, quickly and accurately, for designated items in cluttered environments is crucial for many species to ensure survival. Feature integration theory, one of the most influential theories of attention, suggests that certain visual features that facilitate this search are extracted pre-attentively in a parallel fashion across the visual field during early visual processing. Hence, if some objects of interest possess such a feature uniquely, it will pop out from the background during the integration stage and draw visual attention immediately and effortlessly. For years, visual search research has explored these ideas by investigating the conditions (and visual features) that characterize efficient versus inefficient visual searches. The bulk of research has focused on human vision, though ecologically there are many reasons to believe that feature integration theory is applicable to other species as well. Here we review the main findings regarding the relevance of feature integration theory to non-human species and expand it to new research on one particular animal model - the archerfish. Specifically, we study both archerfish and humans in an extensive and comparative set of visual-search experiments. The findings indicate that both species exhibit similar behavior in basic feature searches and in conjunction search tasks. In contrast, performance differed in searches defined by shape. These results suggest that evolution pressured many visual features to pop out for both species despite cardinal differences in brain anatomy and living environment, and strengthens the argument that aspects of feature integration theory may be generalizable across the animal kingdom.
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18
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Newport C, Schuster S. Archerfish vision: Visual challenges faced by a predator with a unique hunting technique. Semin Cell Dev Biol 2020; 106:53-60. [PMID: 32522409 DOI: 10.1016/j.semcdb.2020.05.017] [Citation(s) in RCA: 5] [Impact Index Per Article: 1.3] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Key Words] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 05/05/2020] [Revised: 05/24/2020] [Accepted: 05/24/2020] [Indexed: 11/28/2022]
Abstract
Archerfish are well-known for their ballistic hunting behaviour, in which they shoot down aerial prey with a well-aimed jet of water. This unique hunting strategy poses several challenges for visual systems. Archerfish face significant distortion to the appearance of targets due to refraction at the air/water interface, they search for prey against a complex background of foliage, they change prey targeting behaviour as conditions change, and they must make high speed decisions to avoid competition. By studying how archerfish have overcome these challenges, we have been able to understand more about fundamental problems faced by visual systems and the mechanisms used to solve them. In some cases, such as when searching for targets, the visual capabilities of archerfish are functionally similar to those of humans, despite significant differences in neuroanatomy. In other cases, the particular challenge faced by archerfish magnifies fundamental problems generally faced by visual systems, such as recognizing objects given strong viewpoint dependent changes to appearance. The efficiency of archerfish retrieving fallen prey to avoid kleptoparasitism, demonstrates that their visual processing excels in both speed and accuracy. In this review, we attempt to provide an overview of the many facets of visually driven behaviour of archerfish, and how they have been studied. In addition to their hunting technique, archerfish are ideal for visual processing experiments as they can be quickly trained to perform a range of non-ecologically relevant tasks. Their behavioural flexibility moreover, introduces the opportunity to study how experience-dependence and choice affects visual processing.
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Affiliation(s)
- Cait Newport
- Department of Zoology, University of Oxford, Oxford, England, United Kingdom.
| | - Stefan Schuster
- Department of Animal Physiology, University of Bayreuth, 95440 Bayreuth, Germany
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19
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Behavioral and neuronal study of inhibition of return in barn owls. Sci Rep 2020; 10:7267. [PMID: 32350332 PMCID: PMC7190666 DOI: 10.1038/s41598-020-64197-9] [Citation(s) in RCA: 7] [Impact Index Per Article: 1.8] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Track Full Text] [Download PDF] [Figures] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 01/21/2020] [Accepted: 04/08/2020] [Indexed: 11/21/2022] Open
Abstract
Inhibition of return (IOR) is the reduction of detection speed and/or detection accuracy of a target in a recently attended location. This phenomenon, which has been discovered and studied thoroughly in humans, is believed to reflect a brain mechanism for controlling the allocation of spatial attention in a manner that enhances efficient search. Findings showing that IOR is robust, apparent at a very early age and seemingly dependent on midbrain activity suggest that IOR is a universal attentional mechanism in vertebrates. However, studies in non-mammalian species are scarce. To explore this hypothesis comparatively, we tested for IOR in barn owls (Tyto alba) using the classical Posner cueing paradigm. Two barn owls were trained to initiate a trial by fixating on the center of a computer screen and then turning their gaze to the location of a target. A short, non-informative cue appeared before the target, either at a location predicting the target (valid) or a location not predicting the target (invalid). In one barn owl, the response times (RT) to the valid targets compared to the invalid targets shifted from facilitation (lower RTs) to inhibition (higher RTs) when increasing the time lag between the cue and the target. The second owl mostly failed to maintain fixation and responded to the cue before the target onset. However, when including in the analysis only the trials in which the owl maintained fixation, an inhibition in the valid trials could be detected. To search for the neural correlates of IOR, we recorded multiunit responses in the optic tectum (OT) of four head-fixed owls passively viewing a cueing paradigm as in the behavioral experiments. At short cue to target lags (<100 ms), neural responses to the target in the receptive field (RF) were usually enhanced if the cue appeared earlier inside the RF (valid) and were suppressed if the cue appeared earlier outside the RF (invalid). This was reversed at longer lags: neural responses were suppressed in the valid conditions and were unaffected in the invalid conditions. The findings support the notion that IOR is a basic mechanism in the evolution of vertebrate behavior and suggest that the effect appears as a result of the interaction between lateral and forward inhibition in the tectal circuitry.
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20
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Categorical Signaling of the Strongest Stimulus by an Inhibitory Midbrain Nucleus. J Neurosci 2020; 40:4172-4184. [PMID: 32300047 DOI: 10.1523/jneurosci.0042-20.2020] [Citation(s) in RCA: 5] [Impact Index Per Article: 1.3] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Key Words] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 01/05/2020] [Revised: 03/04/2020] [Accepted: 04/02/2020] [Indexed: 02/06/2023] Open
Abstract
The nucleus isthmi pars magnocellularis (Imc), a group of inhibitory neurons in the midbrain tegmentum, is a critical component of the spatial selection network in the vertebrate midbrain. It delivers long-range inhibition among different portions of the space map in the optic tectum (OT), thereby mediating stimulus competition in the OT. Here, we investigate the properties of relative strength-dependent competitive interactions within the Imc, in barn owls of both sexes. We find that when Imc neurons are presented simultaneously with one stimulus inside the receptive field and a second, competing stimulus outside, they exhibit gradual or switch-like response profiles as a function of relative stimulus strength. They do so both when the two stimuli are of the same sensory modality (both visual) or of different sensory modalities (visual and auditory). Moreover, Imc neurons signal the strongest stimulus in a dynamically flexible manner, indicating that Imc responses reflect an online comparison between the strengths of the competing stimuli. Notably, Imc neurons signal the strongest stimulus more categorically, and earlier than the OT. Paired recordings at spatially aligned sites in the Imc and OT reveal that although some properties of stimulus competition, such as the bias of competitive response profiles, are correlated, others such as the steepness of response profiles, are set independently. Our results demonstrate that the Imc is itself an active site of competition, and may be the first site in the midbrain selection network at which stimulus competition is resolved.SIGNIFICANCE STATEMENT This work sheds light on the functional properties of a small group of inhibitory neurons in the vertebrate midbrain that play a key part in how the brain selects a target among competitors. A better understanding of the functioning of these neurons is an important building block for the broader understanding of how distracters are suppressed, and of spatial attention and its dysfunction.
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22
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Nafcha O, Shamay-Tsoory S, Gabay S. The sociality of social inhibition of return. Cognition 2020; 195:104108. [DOI: 10.1016/j.cognition.2019.104108] [Citation(s) in RCA: 4] [Impact Index Per Article: 1.0] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 02/04/2019] [Revised: 10/10/2019] [Accepted: 10/11/2019] [Indexed: 10/25/2022]
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What Neuroscientific Studies Tell Us about Inhibition of Return. Vision (Basel) 2019; 3:vision3040058. [PMID: 31735859 PMCID: PMC6969912 DOI: 10.3390/vision3040058] [Citation(s) in RCA: 13] [Impact Index Per Article: 2.6] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Key Words] [Track Full Text] [Download PDF] [Figures] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 04/01/2019] [Revised: 09/11/2019] [Accepted: 10/01/2019] [Indexed: 11/18/2022] Open
Abstract
An inhibitory aftermath of orienting, inhibition of return (IOR), has intrigued scholars since its discovery about 40 years ago. Since then, the phenomenon has been subjected to a wide range of neuroscientific methods and the results of these are reviewed in this paper. These include direct manipulations of brain structures (which occur naturally in brain damage and disease or experimentally as in TMS and lesion studies) and measurements of brain activity (in humans using EEG and fMRI and in animals using single unit recording). A variety of less direct methods (e.g., computational modeling, developmental studies, etc.) have also been used. The findings from this wide range of methods support the critical role of subcortical and cortical oculomotor pathways in the generation and nature of IOR.
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24
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Phillmore LS, Klein RM. The puzzle of spontaneous alternation and inhibition of return: How they might fit together. Hippocampus 2019; 29:762-770. [PMID: 31157942 DOI: 10.1002/hipo.23102] [Citation(s) in RCA: 2] [Impact Index Per Article: 0.4] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Key Words] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 01/18/2019] [Revised: 05/06/2019] [Accepted: 05/11/2019] [Indexed: 11/11/2022]
Abstract
Two isolated spatial phenomena share a similar "been there; done that" effect on spatial behavior. Originally discovered in rodent learning experiments, spontaneous alternation is a tendency for the organism to visit a different arm in a T-maze on subsequent trials. Originally discovered in human studies of attention, inhibition of return is a tendency for the organism to orient away from a previously attended location. Whereas spontaneous alternation was identified by O'Keefe & Nadel as dependent on an intact hippocampus, inhibition of return is dependent on neural structures that participate in oculomotor control (the superior colliculus, parietal and frontal cortex). Despite the isolated literatures, each phenomenon has been assumed to reflect a basic novelty-seeking process, avoiding places previously visited or locations attended. In this commentary, we explore and compare the behavioral manifestations and neural underpinnings of these two phenomena, and suggest what is still needed to determine whether they operate in parallel or serial.
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Affiliation(s)
- Leslie S Phillmore
- Department of Psychology and Neuroscience, Dalhousie University, Halifax, Nova Scotia, Canada
| | - Raymond M Klein
- Department of Psychology and Neuroscience, Dalhousie University, Halifax, Nova Scotia, Canada
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25
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Volotsky S, Vinepinsky E, Donchin O, Segev R. Long-range neural inhibition and stimulus competition in the archerfish optic tectum. J Comp Physiol A Neuroethol Sens Neural Behav Physiol 2019; 205:537-552. [PMID: 31123813 DOI: 10.1007/s00359-019-01345-1] [Citation(s) in RCA: 1] [Impact Index Per Article: 0.2] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Key Words] [MESH Headings] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 04/15/2018] [Revised: 04/28/2019] [Accepted: 05/10/2019] [Indexed: 11/26/2022]
Abstract
The archerfish, which is unique in its ability to hunt insects above the water level by shooting a jet of water at its prey, operates in a complex visual environment. The fish needs to quickly select one object from among many others. In animals other than the archerfish, long-range inhibition is considered to drive selection. As a result of long-range inhibition, a potential target outside a neuron's receptive field suppresses the activity elicited by another potential target within the receptive field. We tested whether a similar mechanism operates in the archerfish by recording the activity of neurons in the optic tectum while presenting a target stimulus inside the receptive field and a competing stimulus outside the receptive field. We held the features of the target constant while varying the size, speed, and distance of the competing stimulus. We found cells that exhibit long-range inhibition; i.e., inhibition that extends to a significant part of the entire visual field of the animal. The competing stimulus depressed the firing rate. In some neurons, this effect was dependent on the features of the competing stimulus. These findings suggest that long-range inhibition may play a crucial role in the target selection process in the archerfish.
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Affiliation(s)
- Svetlana Volotsky
- Department of Biomedical Engineering, Ben-Gurion University of the Negev, 84105, Beer-Sheva, Israel
- Zlotowski Center for Neuroscience, Ben-Gurion University of the Negev, 84105, Beer-Sheva, Israel
| | - Ehud Vinepinsky
- Zlotowski Center for Neuroscience, Ben-Gurion University of the Negev, 84105, Beer-Sheva, Israel
- Department of Life Sciences, Ben-Gurion University of the Negev, 84105, Beer-Sheva, Israel
| | - Opher Donchin
- Department of Biomedical Engineering, Ben-Gurion University of the Negev, 84105, Beer-Sheva, Israel
- Zlotowski Center for Neuroscience, Ben-Gurion University of the Negev, 84105, Beer-Sheva, Israel
| | - Ronen Segev
- Department of Biomedical Engineering, Ben-Gurion University of the Negev, 84105, Beer-Sheva, Israel.
- Zlotowski Center for Neuroscience, Ben-Gurion University of the Negev, 84105, Beer-Sheva, Israel.
- Department of Life Sciences, Ben-Gurion University of the Negev, 84105, Beer-Sheva, Israel.
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No supplementary evidence of attention to a spatial cue when saccadic facilitation is absent. Sci Rep 2018; 8:13289. [PMID: 30185930 PMCID: PMC6125402 DOI: 10.1038/s41598-018-31633-w] [Citation(s) in RCA: 2] [Impact Index Per Article: 0.3] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Track Full Text] [Download PDF] [Figures] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 11/28/2017] [Accepted: 08/23/2018] [Indexed: 11/16/2022] Open
Abstract
Attending a location in space facilitates responses to targets at that location when the time between cue and target is short. Certain types of exogenous cues – such as sudden peripheral onsets – have been described as reflexive and automatic. Recent studies however, have been showing many cases where exogenous cues are less automatic than previously believed and do not always result in facilitation. A lack of the behavioral facilitation, however, does not automatically necessitate a lack of underlying attention to that location. We test exogenous cueing in two experiments where facilitation is and is not likely to be observed with saccadic responses. We also test alternate measures linked to the allocation of attention such as saccadic curvature, microsaccades and pupil size. As expected, we find early facilitation as measured by saccadic reaction time when CTOAs are predictable but not when they are randomized within a block. We find no impact of the cue on microsaccade direction for either experiment, and only a slight dip in the frequency of microsaccades after the cue. We do find that change in pupil size to the cue predicts the magnitude of the validity effect, but only in the experiment where facilitation was observed. In both experiments, we observed a tendency for saccadic curvature to deviate away from the cued location and this was stronger for early CTOAs and toward vertical targets. Overall, we find that only change in pupil size is consistent with observed facilitation. Saccadic curvature is influenced by the onset of the cue, buts its direction is indicative of oculomotor inhibition whether we see RT facilitation or not. Microsaccades were not diagnostic in either experiment. Finally, we see little to no evidence of attention at the cued location in any additional measures when facilitation of saccadic responses is absent.
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Saban W, Gabay S, Kalanthroff E. More than just channeling: The role of subcortical mechanisms in executive functions - Evidence from the Stroop task. Acta Psychol (Amst) 2018; 189:36-42. [PMID: 28291524 DOI: 10.1016/j.actpsy.2017.03.001] [Citation(s) in RCA: 14] [Impact Index Per Article: 2.3] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Key Words] [MESH Headings] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 06/05/2016] [Revised: 01/01/2017] [Accepted: 03/03/2017] [Indexed: 11/16/2022] Open
Abstract
The literature has long emphasized the role of the cerebral cortex in executive functions. Recently, however, several researchers have suggested that subcortical areas might also be involved in executive functions. The current study explored the possibility that subcortical mechanisms have a functional role in adaptive resolution of Stroop interference. We asked 20 participants to complete a cued task-switching Stroop task with variable cue-target intervals (CTI). Using a stereoscope, we manipulated which eye was shown the relevant dimension and which was shown the irrelevant dimension. This technique allowed us to examine the involvement of monocularly segregated - subcortical - regions of the visual processing stream. The interference effect was modulated by this eye-of-origin manipulation in the 0 CTI condition. This finding provides a novel indication for the notion that subcortical regions have a functional role in the resolution of Stroop interference. This indication suggests that cortical regions are not solely involved and that a dynamic interaction between cortical and subcortical regions is involved in executive functions.
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Affiliation(s)
- William Saban
- Department of Psychology and the Institute of Information Processing and Decision Making (IIPDM), University of Haifa, Israel.
| | - Shai Gabay
- Department of Psychology and the Institute of Information Processing and Decision Making (IIPDM), University of Haifa, Israel
| | - Eyal Kalanthroff
- Department of Psychology, The Hebrew University of Jerusalem, Israel
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Ben-Tov M, Ben-Shahar O, Segev R. What a predator can teach us about visual processing: a lesson from the archerfish. Curr Opin Neurobiol 2018; 52:80-87. [PMID: 29727858 DOI: 10.1016/j.conb.2018.04.001] [Citation(s) in RCA: 9] [Impact Index Per Article: 1.5] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 01/06/2018] [Revised: 02/27/2018] [Accepted: 04/07/2018] [Indexed: 10/17/2022]
Abstract
The archerfish is a predator with highly unusual visually guided behavior. It is most famous for its ability to hunt by shooting water jets at static or dynamic insect prey, up to two meters above the water's surface. In the lab, the archerfish can learn to distinguish and shoot at artificial targets presented on a computer screen, thus enabling well-controlled experiments. In recent years, these capacities have turned the archerfish into a model animal for studying a variety of visual functions, from visual saliency and visual search, through fast visually guided prediction, and all the way to higher level visual processing such as face recognition. Here we review these recent developments and show how they fall into two emerging lines of research on this animal model. The first is ethologically motivated and emphasizes how the natural environment and habitat of the archerfish interact with its visual processing during predation. The second is driven by parallels to the primate brain and aims to determine whether the latter's characteristic visual information processing capacities can also be found in the qualitatively different fish brain, thereby underscoring the functional universality of certain visual processes. We discuss the differences between these two lines of research and possible future directions.
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Affiliation(s)
- Mor Ben-Tov
- Department of Neurobiology, Duke University, Durham, NC 27710, United States
| | - Ohad Ben-Shahar
- Computer Sciences Department, Ben Gurion University of the Negev, Israel; Life Sciences Department, Ben Gurion University of the Negev, Israel
| | - Ronen Segev
- Life Sciences Department, Ben Gurion University of the Negev, Israel; Zlotowski Center for Neuroscience, Ben Gurion University of the Negev, Israel; Biomedical Engineering Department, Ben Gurion University of the Negev, Israel.
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29
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Krauzlis RJ, Bogadhi AR, Herman JP, Bollimunta A. Selective attention without a neocortex. Cortex 2018; 102:161-175. [PMID: 28958417 PMCID: PMC5832524 DOI: 10.1016/j.cortex.2017.08.026] [Citation(s) in RCA: 62] [Impact Index Per Article: 10.3] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Key Words] [MESH Headings] [Grants] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 03/24/2017] [Revised: 08/04/2017] [Accepted: 08/16/2017] [Indexed: 12/01/2022]
Abstract
Selective attention refers to the ability to restrict neural processing and behavioral responses to a relevant subset of available stimuli, while simultaneously excluding other valid stimuli from consideration. In primates and other mammals, descriptions of this ability typically emphasize the neural processing that takes place in the cerebral neocortex. However, non-mammals such as birds, reptiles, amphibians and fish, which completely lack a neocortex, also have the ability to selectively attend. In this article, we survey the behavioral evidence for selective attention in non-mammals, and review the midbrain and forebrain structures that are responsible. The ancestral forms of selective attention are presumably selective orienting behaviors, such as prey-catching and predator avoidance. These behaviors depend critically on a set of subcortical structures, including the optic tectum (OT), thalamus and striatum, that are highly conserved across vertebrate evolution. In contrast, the contributions of different pallial regions in the forebrain to selective attention have been subject to more substantial changes and reorganization. This evolutionary perspective makes plain that selective attention is not a function achieved de novo with the emergence of the neocortex, but instead is implemented by circuits accrued and modified over hundreds of millions of years, beginning well before the forebrain contained a neocortex. Determining how older subcortical circuits interact with the more recently evolved components in the neocortex will likely be crucial for understanding the complex properties of selective attention in primates and other mammals, and for identifying the etiology of attention disorders.
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Affiliation(s)
- Richard J Krauzlis
- Laboratory of Sensorimotor Research, National Eye Institute, Bethesda, USA.
| | | | - James P Herman
- Laboratory of Sensorimotor Research, National Eye Institute, Bethesda, USA
| | - Anil Bollimunta
- Laboratory of Sensorimotor Research, National Eye Institute, Bethesda, USA
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Reichenthal A, Ben-Tov M, Segev R. Coding Schemes in the Archerfish Optic Tectum. Front Neural Circuits 2018; 12:18. [PMID: 29559898 PMCID: PMC5845554 DOI: 10.3389/fncir.2018.00018] [Citation(s) in RCA: 3] [Impact Index Per Article: 0.5] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Key Words] [Track Full Text] [Download PDF] [Figures] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 11/28/2017] [Accepted: 02/13/2018] [Indexed: 01/11/2023] Open
Abstract
Many studies have yielded valuable knowledge on the early visual system but it is biased since the studies have focused on terrestrial mammals alone. Here, to better account for visual systems in different environments and animal classes, we studied the structure of early visual processing in the archerfish which harnesses its extreme visual ability to hunt by shooting water jets at prey hanging on vegetation above the water. Thus, the archerfish provides a unique opportunity to study visual processing in a vertebrate which is an expert vision-guided predator with a very different brain structure than mammals. The receptive field structures in the archerfish (both sexes) optic tectum, the main visual processing region in the fish brain, were measured and linear non-linear cascades were used to analyze their properties. The findings indicate that the spatial receptive field structures lie on a continuum between circular and elliptical shapes. In addition, the cells' functional properties display a richness of response characteristics, since many cells could be captured by more than a single linear filter. Finally, the non-linear response functions that link linear filters and neuronal responses were found to be similar to the non-linear functions of models that describe terrestrial mammalian single cell activity. Overall our results help to better understand the early visual processing system across vertebrates.
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Affiliation(s)
- Adam Reichenthal
- Life Sciences Department and Zlotowski Center for Neuroscience, Ben Gurion University of the Negev, Beersheba, Israel
| | - Mor Ben-Tov
- Department of Neurobiology, Duke University, Durham, NC, United States
| | - Ronen Segev
- Life Sciences Department and Zlotowski Center for Neuroscience, Ben Gurion University of the Negev, Beersheba, Israel
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31
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Abstract
Human volitional orienting is typically assessed using Posner's endogenous cuing task. As a volitional process, the literature has long emphasized the role of neocortical structures in this higher cognitive function. Based on recent data, we explored the possibility that subcortical channels may have a functional role in volitional orienting as measured by a Posner cuing task in which a nonspatial feature of a centrally presented cue is predictively related to the location of the target. In addition, we have compared this typical cuing task to a "purer" version, which does not involve the probability manipulation. A sensitive behavioral method was used to probe the contribution of monocular channels (mostly subcortical) in the two types of endogenous orienting tasks. In both tasks, a spatially informative cue and its ensuing target were presented to the same or different eyes at varying cue-target intervals. In the typically used endogenous task, the onset of facilitation was apparent earlier when the cue and target were presented to the same eye. In contrast, in the "pure" task no difference was found between the two eye-of-origin conditions. These data support the notion that endogenous facilitation, as measured in the typical Posner cuing task, involves lower monocular regions. Hence, in the typical endogenous task, which was developed to explore "volitional" orienting, a simple associative learning mechanism might elicit monocular, rapid orienting responses. Notably, the typical volitional orienting paradigm might be contaminated by simple contingency benefits and thus may not provide a pure measure of volitional processes.
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Saban W, Sekely L, Klein RM, Gabay S. Monocular channels have a functional role in endogenous orienting. Neuropsychologia 2018; 111:1-7. [PMID: 29317323 DOI: 10.1016/j.neuropsychologia.2018.01.002] [Citation(s) in RCA: 8] [Impact Index Per Article: 1.3] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Key Words] [MESH Headings] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 05/15/2016] [Revised: 12/25/2017] [Accepted: 01/04/2018] [Indexed: 01/30/2023]
Abstract
The literature has long emphasized the role of higher cortical structures in endogenous orienting. Based on evolutionary explanation and previous data, we explored the possibility that lower monocular channels may also have a functional role in endogenous orienting of attention. Sensitive behavioral manipulation was used to probe the contribution of monocularly segregated regions in a simple cue - target detection task. A central spatially informative cue, and its ensuing target, were presented to the same or different eyes at varying cue-target intervals. Results indicated that the onset of endogenous orienting was apparent earlier when the cue and target were presented to the same eye. The data provides converging evidence for the notion that endogenous facilitation is modulated by monocular portions of the visual stream. This, in turn, suggests that higher cortical mechanisms are not exclusively responsible for endogenous orienting, and that a dynamic interaction between higher and lower neural levels, might be involved.
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Affiliation(s)
- William Saban
- Department of Psychology and the Institute of Information Processing and Decision Making (IIPDM), University of Haifa, Israel.
| | - Liora Sekely
- Department of Psychology and the Institute of Information Processing and Decision Making (IIPDM), University of Haifa, Israel
| | - Raymond M Klein
- Department of Psychology and Neuroscience, Dalhousie University, Halifax, Nova Scotia, Canada
| | - Shai Gabay
- Department of Psychology and the Institute of Information Processing and Decision Making (IIPDM), University of Haifa, Israel.
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Abstract
The literature has long emphasized the neocortex's role in volitional processes. In this work, we examined endogenous orienting in an evolutionarily older species, the archer fish, which lacks neocortex-like cells. We used Posner's classic endogenous cuing task, in which a centrally presented, spatially informative cue is followed by a target. The fish responded to the target by shooting a stream of water at it. Interestingly, the fish demonstrated a human-like "volitional" facilitation effect: their reaction times to targets that appeared on the side indicated by the precue were faster than their reaction times to targets on the opposite side. The fish also exhibited inhibition of return, an aftermath of orienting that commonly emerges only in reflexive orienting tasks in human participants. We believe that this pattern demonstrates the acquisition of an arbitrary connection between spatial orienting and a nonspatial feature of a centrally presented stimulus in nonprimate species. In the literature on human attention, orienting in response to such contingencies has been strongly associated with volitional control. We discuss the implications of these results for the evolution of orienting, and for the study of volitional processes in all species, including humans.
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Affiliation(s)
- William Saban
- Department of Psychology, University of Haifa, Haifa, Israel 3498838;
- The Institute of Information Processing and Decision Making, University of Haifa, Haifa, Israel 3498838
| | - Liora Sekely
- Department of Psychology, University of Haifa, Haifa, Israel 3498838
- The Institute of Information Processing and Decision Making, University of Haifa, Haifa, Israel 3498838
| | - Raymond M Klein
- Department of Psychology and Neuroscience, Dalhousie University, Halifax, Nova Scotia B3H 4R2, Canada
| | - Shai Gabay
- Department of Psychology, University of Haifa, Haifa, Israel 3498838;
- The Institute of Information Processing and Decision Making, University of Haifa, Haifa, Israel 3498838
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Karoubi N, Segev R, Wullimann MF. The Brain of the Archerfish Toxotes chatareus: A Nissl-Based Neuroanatomical Atlas and Catecholaminergic/Cholinergic Systems. Front Neuroanat 2016; 10:106. [PMID: 27891081 PMCID: PMC5104738 DOI: 10.3389/fnana.2016.00106] [Citation(s) in RCA: 19] [Impact Index Per Article: 2.4] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Key Words] [Track Full Text] [Download PDF] [Figures] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 08/08/2016] [Accepted: 10/13/2016] [Indexed: 01/30/2023] Open
Abstract
Over recent years, the seven-spot archerfish (Toxotes chatareus) has emerged as a new model for studies in visual and behavioral neuroscience thanks to its unique hunting strategy. Its natural ability to spit at insects outside of water can be used in the laboratory for well controlled behavioral experiments where the fish is trained to aim at targets on a screen. The need for a documentation of the neuroanatomy of this animal became critical as more research groups use it as a model. Here we present an atlas of adult T. chatareus specimens caught in the wild in South East Asia. The atlas shows representative sections of the brain and specific structures revealed by a classic Nissl staining as well as corresponding schematic drawings. Additional immunostainings for catecholaminergic and cholinergic systems were conducted to corroborate the identification of certain nuclei and the data of a whole brain scanner is available online. We describe the general features of the archerfish brain as well as its specificities, especially for the visual system and compare the neuroanatomy of the archerfish with other teleosts. This atlas of the archerfish brain shows all levels of the neuraxis and intends to provide a solid basis for further neuroscientific research on T. chatareus, in particular electrophysiological studies.
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Affiliation(s)
- Naomi Karoubi
- Life Sciences Department and Zlotowski Center for Neuroscience, Ben-Gurion University of the Negev Beersheba, Israel
| | - Ronen Segev
- Life Sciences Department and Zlotowski Center for Neuroscience, Ben-Gurion University of the Negev Beersheba, Israel
| | - Mario F Wullimann
- Graduate School of Systemic Neurosciences and Division of Neurobiology, Department Biology II, Ludwig-Maximilians-University of Munich Munich, Germany
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Abstract
Following a salient cue that attracts attention to a specific spatial location, perceptual processing of information at that location is facilitated if the interval between the cue and target is brief, or, is inhibited if the interval between the cue and target is long. The mechanisms mediating these attentional dynamics continue to be the subject on ongoing debate. On one classic account, facilitation and inhibition of return (IOR) are two ends of a continuum, generated by the same underlying mechanism. Other accounts have postulated that these two attentional processes emerge from independent systems. To address these alternatives, we report data from three experiments in which a cue and its ensuing target are presented to the same or different eyes at varying cue-target intervals. Whereas the onset of facilitation was apparent earlier when the cue and target shared the eye-of-origin, the onset of IOR was not affected by the eye to which the cue and target were presented. This finding implicates at least some, if not full, independence in the system(s) that give rise to attentional facilitation and IOR, and, moreover, suggests that facilitation may be more reliant on subcortical levels of the visual pathways than IOR.
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Inhibition of return: A phenomenon in search of a definition and a theoretical framework. Atten Percept Psychophys 2015; 77:1647-58. [DOI: 10.3758/s13414-015-0835-3] [Citation(s) in RCA: 25] [Impact Index Per Article: 2.8] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Indexed: 11/08/2022]
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37
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Pop-out in visual search of moving targets in the archer fish. Nat Commun 2015; 6:6476. [PMID: 25753807 DOI: 10.1038/ncomms7476] [Citation(s) in RCA: 40] [Impact Index Per Article: 4.4] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 11/20/2014] [Accepted: 02/02/2015] [Indexed: 11/09/2022] Open
Abstract
Pop-out in visual search reflects the capacity of observers to rapidly detect visual targets independent of the number of distracting objects in the background. Although it may be beneficial to most animals, pop-out behaviour has been observed only in mammals, where neural correlates are found in primary visual cortex as contextually modulated neurons that encode aspects of saliency. Here we show that archer fish can also utilize this important search mechanism by exhibiting pop-out of moving targets. We explore neural correlates of this behaviour and report the presence of contextually modulated neurons in the optic tectum that may constitute the neural substrate for a saliency map. Furthermore, we find that both behaving fish and neural responses exhibit additive responses to multiple visual features. These findings suggest that similar neural computations underlie pop-out behaviour in mammals and fish, and that pop-out may be a universal search mechanism across all vertebrates.
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Eye movements are primed toward the center of multiple stimuli even when the interstimulus distances are too large to generate saccade averaging. Exp Brain Res 2015; 233:1541-9. [PMID: 25716611 DOI: 10.1007/s00221-015-4227-7] [Citation(s) in RCA: 5] [Impact Index Per Article: 0.6] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 07/22/2014] [Accepted: 02/10/2015] [Indexed: 10/24/2022]
Abstract
Prior oculomotor research has established that saccades tend to land near the center of multiple saccade targets when they are near each other. This saccade averaging phenomenon (or global effect) has been ascribed to short-distance lateral excitation between neurons in the superior colliculus. Further, at greater inter-stimulus distances, eye movements tend toward the individual elements. This transition to control by local elements (individuation) with inter-stimulus distance has been attributed to long-range lateral inhibition between neurons in winner-take-all models of oculomotor behavior. We hypothesized that the traditional method of requiring a saccade to an array of multiple, simultaneous targets may entail response ambiguity that intensifies with distance. We resolved the ambiguity by focussing on reaction time of our human participants to a single saccade target after one or more simultaneous priming stimuli. At a 50-ms prime-target interval, saccadic reaction time was shortest for targets closer to the center of the prime stimuli independent of the distance between the primes. This effect was gone at 400 ms. These findings challenge the typical inferences about the neural control of oculomotor behavior that have been derived from the boundary between saccade averaging and individuation and provide a new method to explore eye movements with lessened impact from decision processes.
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39
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Newport C, Wallis G, Siebeck UE. Concept learning and the use of three common psychophysical paradigms in the archerfish (Toxotes chatareus). Front Neural Circuits 2014; 8:39. [PMID: 24795572 PMCID: PMC4006028 DOI: 10.3389/fncir.2014.00039] [Citation(s) in RCA: 13] [Impact Index Per Article: 1.3] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Key Words] [Track Full Text] [Download PDF] [Figures] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 11/25/2013] [Accepted: 04/04/2014] [Indexed: 11/13/2022] Open
Abstract
Archerfish are well known for their specialized hunting technique of spitting water at prey located above the water line. This unique ability has made them a popular focus of study as researchers try to understand the mechanisms involved in targeting and spitting. In more recent years, archerfish have also become an increasingly popular model for studying visual discrimination and learning in general. Until now, only the alternative forced-choice (AFC) task has been used with archerfish, however, they may be capable of learning other classical discrimination tasks. As well as providing alternative, and potentially more efficient, means for testing their visual capabilities, these other tasks may also provide deeper insight into the extent to which an organism with no cortex can grasp the concepts underlying these tasks. In this paper, we consider both the matched-to-sample (MTS) and the odd-one-out (OOO) tasks as they require the subject to learn relatively sophisticated concepts rather than a straight, stimulus-reward relationship, of the kind underlying AFC tasks. A variety of line drawings displayed on a monitor were used as stimuli. We first determined if archerfish could complete the MTS and OOO test and then evaluated their ability to be retrained to new stimuli using a 4-AFC test. We found that archerfish were unable to learn the MTS and had only a limited capacity for learning the OOO task. We conclude that the MTS and OOO are impractical as paradigms for behavioral experiments with archerfish. However, the archerfish could rapidly learn to complete an AFC test and select the conditioned stimulus with a high degree of accuracy when faced with four stimuli, making this a powerful test for behavioral studies testing visual discrimination. In addition, the fish were able to learn the concept of oddity under particular training circumstances. This paper adds to the growing evidence that animals without a cortex are capable of learning some higher order concepts.
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Affiliation(s)
- Cait Newport
- Laboratory for Visual Neuroethology, School of Biomedical Sciences, The University of Queensland Brisbane, QLD, Australia
| | - Guy Wallis
- Centre for Sensorimotor Neuroscience, School of Human Movement Studies, The University of Queensland Brisbane, QLD, Australia ; Queensland Brain Institute, The University of Queensland Brisbane, QLD, Australia
| | - Ulrike E Siebeck
- Laboratory for Visual Neuroethology, School of Biomedical Sciences, The University of Queensland Brisbane, QLD, Australia
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Gabay S, Burlingham C, Behrmann M. The nature of face representations in subcortical regions. Neuropsychologia 2014; 59:35-46. [PMID: 24751992 DOI: 10.1016/j.neuropsychologia.2014.04.010] [Citation(s) in RCA: 20] [Impact Index Per Article: 2.0] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Key Words] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 01/08/2014] [Revised: 03/30/2014] [Accepted: 04/11/2014] [Indexed: 10/25/2022]
Abstract
Studies examining the neural correlates of face perception in humans have focused almost exclusively on the distributed cortical network of face-selective regions. Recently, however, investigations have also identified subcortical correlates of face perception and the question addressed here concerns the nature of these subcortical face representations. To explore this issue, we presented to participants pairs of images sequentially to the same or to different eyes. Superior performance in the former over latter condition implicates monocular, prestriate portions of the visual system. Over a series of five experiments, we manipulated both lower-level (size, location) as well as higher-level (identity) similarity across the pair of faces. A monocular advantage was observed even when the faces in a pair differed in location and in size, implicating some subcortical invariance across lower-level image properties. A monocular advantage was also observed when the faces in a pair were two different images of the same individual, indicating the engagement of subcortical representations in more abstract, higher-level aspects of face processing. We conclude that subcortical structures of the visual system are involved, perhaps interactively, in multiple aspects of face perception, and not simply in deriving initial coarse representations.
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Affiliation(s)
- Shai Gabay
- Department of Psychology, Carnegie Mellon University, 5000 Forbes Ave, Pittsburgh, PA 15213, USA.
| | - Charles Burlingham
- Department of Psychology, Carnegie Mellon University, 5000 Forbes Ave, Pittsburgh, PA 15213, USA
| | - Marlene Behrmann
- Department of Psychology, Carnegie Mellon University, 5000 Forbes Ave, Pittsburgh, PA 15213, USA.
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Wagner U, Baker L, Rostron C. Searching for inhibition of return in the rat using the covert orienting of attention task. Anim Cogn 2014; 17:1121-35. [PMID: 24682709 DOI: 10.1007/s10071-014-0745-0] [Citation(s) in RCA: 1] [Impact Index Per Article: 0.1] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 08/05/2013] [Revised: 02/15/2014] [Accepted: 03/18/2014] [Indexed: 10/25/2022]
Abstract
Inhibition of return (IOR) is an important psychological construct describing inhibited responses to previously attended locations. In humans, it is investigated using Posner's cueing paradigm. This paradigm requires central visual fixation and detection of cued stimuli to the left or right of the fixation point. Stimuli can be validly or invalidly cued, appearing in the same or opposite location to the cue. Although a rat version of the spatial cueing paradigm (the covert orienting of attention task) does exist, IOR has so far not been demonstrated. We therefore investigated whether IOR could be robustly demonstrated in adult male rats using the covert orienting of attention task. This task is conducted in holed wall operant chambers with the central three holes mimicking the set-up for Posner cueing. Across four samples of rats (overall n = 84), we manipulated the following task parameters: stimulus onset asynchronies (Experiments 1-3), cue brightness (Experiment 1b) and the presence of a central reorienting event (Experiment 4). In Experiment 1, we also investigated strain differences by comparing Lister Hooded rats to Sprague-Dawley rats. Although Lister Hooded rats briefly showed evidence of IOR (Experiment 1a, and see Online Resource 1 data), we were unable to replicate this finding in our other experiments using different samples of this strain. Taken together, our findings suggest that IOR cannot be robustly demonstrated in the rat using the covert orienting of attention task conducted in holed wall operant chambers.
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Affiliation(s)
- Ulf Wagner
- Faculty of Health and Wellbeing, Sheffield Hallam University, Sheffield, UK
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Newport C, Wallis G, Temple SE, Siebeck UE. Complex, context-dependent decision strategies of archerfish, Toxotes chatareus. Anim Behav 2013. [DOI: 10.1016/j.anbehav.2013.09.031] [Citation(s) in RCA: 14] [Impact Index Per Article: 1.3] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Indexed: 10/26/2022]
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