Do Honey Bees (Apis mellifera) Form Cognitive Representations of Unconditioned Stimuli?

Harrington Wells,Charles I. Abramson,Kiri Li N. Stauch

doi:10.46867/ijcp.2020.33.00.02

Abstract

Previous research looking at expectancy in animals has used various experimental designs focusing on appetitive and avoidance behaviors. In this study, honey bees (Apis mellifera) were tested ina series of three proboscis extension response (PER) experiments to determine to what degree honey bees’ form a cognitive-representation of an unconditioned stimulus (US). Tthe first experiment, bees were presented with either a 2 sec. sucrose US or 2 sec. honey US appetitive reward and the proboscis-extension duration was measured under each scenario. The PER duration was longer for the honey US even though each US was presented for just 2 sec. Honey bees in the second experiment were tested during extinction trials on a conditioned stimulus (CS) of cinnamon or lavender that was paired with either the sucrose US or honey US in the acquisition trials. The proportion of bees showing the PER response to the CS was recorded for each extinction trial for each US scenario, as was the duration of the proboscis extension for each bee. Neither measure differed between the honey US and sucrose US scenarios, In experiment three, bees were presented with a cinnamon or lavender CS paired with either honey US or sucrose US in a set of acquisition trials, but here the US was not given until after the proboscis was retracted. The PER duration after the CS, and again subsequent after the US, were recorded. While the PER duration after the US was longer for honey, the PER duration after the CS did not differ between honey US and sucrose US.

Highlights

Previous research studies looking at expectancy in animals have used various experimental designs that focused on appetitive and avoidance behaviors
Honey bees in the second experiment were tested during extinction trials on a conditioned stimulus (CS) of cinnamon or lavender that was paired with the same unconditioned stimulus (US) used in the acquisition trials
US, the question became whether a CS paired with the honey US versus sucrose US resulted in a conditioned response consistent with the UR-proboscis extension response (PER) duration of Experiment 1

Summary

Introduction

Previous research studies looking at expectancy in animals have used various experimental designs that focused on appetitive and avoidance behaviors. The rationale behind the work presented here are the experiments performed by Konorski (1967), which suggested that an unconditioned response can be partitioned into consummatory and preparatory responses This partition suggests that one method of studying whether invertebrates form representations of cognitive events is to create a situation where the unconditioned response differs between two unconditioned stimuli. This research stems back to the work of von Frisch on the appetitive conditioning of free-flying bees to targets (Abramson, 1990, 1994) and, more recently, on the use of free-flying foragers visiting artificial flower patches (e.g., Giray et al, 2015; Sanderson et al, 2006) When bees forage, they store the locations and best visiting times associated with the most profitable flower patches (Chittka, 2017; Giurfa, 2007). This would be in line with bees having nontrivial cognitive representation abilities, discussed below

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