Journal
SCIENCE
Volume 355, Issue 6327, Pages 834-+Publisher
AMER ASSOC ADVANCEMENT SCIENCE
DOI: 10.1126/science.aag2360
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Funding
- Jenny and Antti Wihuri Foundation
- Marie Curie Postdoctoral Fellowship
- European Research Council Advanced Grant
- Royal Society Wolfson Research Merit Award
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We explored bees' behavioral flexibility in a task that required transporting a small ball to a defined location to gain a reward. Bees were pretrained to know the correct location of the ball. Subsequently, to obtain a reward, bees had to move a displaced ball to the defined location. Bees that observed demonstration of the technique from a live or model demonstrator learned the task more efficiently than did bees observing a ghost demonstration (ball moved via magnet) or without demonstration. Instead of copying demonstrators moving balls over long distances, observers solved the task more efficiently, using the ball positioned closest to the target, even if it was of a different color than the one previously observed. Such unprecedented cognitive flexibility hints that entirely novel behaviors could emerge relatively swiftly in species whose lifestyle demands advanced learning abilities, should relevant ecological pressures arise.
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