Animal Memory: The Role of “Instructions”

Abstract Animal memory research has largely ignored the ambiguity of test conditions resulting from the absence of, what for humans would be called, adequate instructions. A number of examples, from both the animal learning and animal cognition literatures, are provided which suggest that the apparent memory loss that has been reported may be attributable to such “instructional artifacts.” In general, little attempt has been made to separate these effects from true memory loss. Thus, many of the parallels that have been drawn between the animal cognition and human cognition literatures may be inappropriate and may need to be reevaluated. Once these nonmemorial artifacts have been better identified, research designs can be developed to isolate them from true memory effects. Finally, to the extent that a common terminology can facilitate communication among researchers, viewing such nonmemorial performance decrements as instructional failures may have considerable heuristic value.