Associative learning in honey bees

Abstract

in spatial orientation and learning during dance communication, but the mechanisms of this kind of learning are little understood. In associative learning, stimuli experienced immediately before the reward (usually sucrose solution) are memorized for the guidance of future behavior. Well-established paradigms have been used to characterize operant and classical conditioning. The classical conditioning of olfactory stimuli is a very effective form of learning in bees and has helped to describe the behavioral and physiological basis of memory formation. It is concluded that memory needs time to be established and is processed in sequential phases. The neuronal compartments of the brain involved in the chemosensory pathway appear to participate differently in the sequential memory phases. A model is developed which assigns the strong non-associative components in olfactory conditioning to the antennal lobes, and the associative components to the mushroom bodies and the lateral output region of the protocerebrum. It is speculated that the amnesia-sensitive memory resides in the mushroom bodies and the amnesia-resistant memory in certain structures (eg the lateral protocerebrum) perhaps together with the mushroom bodies.