Learning and Behavioral Ecology: Incomplete Information and Environmental Predictability

When a foraging notonecif bug extracts the juices from a prey item, it will, at some point, stop extracting and begin to search for another prey item. Behavioral ecologists have found that predators, like my hypothetical notonectid, will extract a high proportion of the available resources from a given prey, taking a long time to do it, when prey are scarce, but the same predator will extract less and give up more quickly if prey are abundant.

[1]  K. Garrison,et al.  General principles of learning. , 1929 .

[2]  W. Thorpe Learning and instinct in animals , 1956 .

[3]  John Garcia,et al.  Learning with prolonged delay of reinforcement , 1966 .

[4]  John Garcia,et al.  Relation of cue to consequence in avoidance learning , 1966 .

[5]  R. Levins Evolution in Changing Environments , 1968 .

[6]  M. Seligman,et al.  Biological boundaries of learning. , 1972 .

[7]  J. P. Gould Risk, stochastic preference, and the value of information , 1974 .

[8]  G. Estabrook,et al.  Strategy for a Predator Encountering a Model-Mimic System , 1974, The American Naturalist.

[9]  Robert K. Colwell,et al.  PREDICTABILITY, CONSTANCY, AND CONTINGENCY OF PERIODIC PHENOMENA' , 1974 .

[10]  A. Rapoport,et al.  An Optimal Strategy of Evolution , 1974, The Quarterly Review of Biology.

[11]  J. Alcock Animal Behavior: An Evolutionary Approach , 1975 .

[12]  M E Bitterman,et al.  The comparative analysis of learning. , 1975, Science.

[13]  S. Shettleworth Reinforcement and the organization of behavior in golden hamsters: Hunger, environment, and food reinforcement. , 1975 .

[14]  L. Bobisud,et al.  One-Trial Versus Multi-Trial Learning for a Predator Encountering a Model- Mimic System , 1976, The American Naturalist.

[15]  A. Oaten,et al.  Optimal foraging in patches: a case for stochasticity. , 1977, Theoretical population biology.

[16]  Sara J. Shettleworth,et al.  Reinforcement and the organization of behavior in golden hamsters: Sunflower seed and nest paper reinforcers , 1978 .

[17]  J. Krebs,et al.  Behavioural Ecology: An Evolutionary Approach , 1978 .

[18]  P. Taylor,et al.  Test of optimal sampling by foraging great tits , 1978 .

[19]  S. J. Arnold The Evolution of a Special Class of Modifiable Behaviors in Relation to Environmental Pattern , 1978, The American Naturalist.

[20]  H. C. Plotkin,et al.  Learning, Change, and Evolution: An Enquiry into the Teleonomy of Learning , 1979 .

[21]  A Houston,et al.  The application of statistical decision theory to animal behaviour. , 1980, Journal of theoretical biology.

[22]  J. Ollason Learning to forage--optimally? , 1980, Theoretical population biology.

[23]  Richard F. Green,et al.  Bayesian birds: A simple example of Oaten's stochastic model of optimal foraging , 1980 .

[24]  Alan C. Kamil,et al.  Foraging behavior: ecological, ethological, and psychological approaches , 1980 .

[25]  H. Pulliam,et al.  Programmed to Learn: An Essay on the Evolution of Culture , 1980 .

[26]  S. Shettleworth Reinforcement and the Organisation of Behaviour in Golden Hamsters: Differential Overshadowing of a CS by different Responses , 1981 .

[27]  Y. Iwasa,et al.  Prey Distribution as a Factor Determining the Choice of Optimal Foraging Strategy , 1981, The American Naturalist.

[28]  J. McNamara Optimal patch use in a stochastic environment , 1982 .

[29]  J. Staddon Adaptive behavior and learning , 1983 .

[30]  P. Slater,et al.  Genes, development and learning , 1983 .

[31]  Alan C. Kamil,et al.  Optimal Foraging Theory and the Psychology of Learning , 1983 .

[32]  Richard F. Green,et al.  Stopping Rules for Optimal Foragers , 1984, The American Naturalist.

[33]  S. L. Lima,et al.  Downy Woodpecker Foraging Behavior: Efficient Sampling in Simple Stochastic Environments , 1984 .

[34]  R. Greenberg A comparison of foliage discrimination learning in a specialist and a generalist species of migrant wood warbler (Aves: Parulidae) , 1985 .

[35]  E. Macphail Vertebrate intelligence: the null hypothesis , 1985 .

[36]  R. Lande,et al.  GENOTYPE‐ENVIRONMENT INTERACTION AND THE EVOLUTION OF PHENOTYPIC PLASTICITY , 1985, Evolution; international journal of organic evolution.

[37]  E. Fantino,et al.  Choice, optimal foraging, and the delay-reduction hypothesis , 1985, Behavioral and Brain Sciences.

[38]  D. Papaj INTERPOPULATION DIFFERENCES IN HOST PREFERENCE AND THE EVOLUTION OF LEARNING IN THE BUTTERFLY, BATTUS PHILENOR , 1986, Evolution; international journal of organic evolution.

[39]  A. Kamil,et al.  A synthetic approach to the study of animal intelligence. , 1987, Nebraska Symposium on Motivation. Nebraska Symposium on Motivation.

[40]  S. Tamm Tracking varying environments: sampling by hummingbirds , 1987, Animal Behaviour.

[41]  D. Leger Comparative perspectives in modern psychology. , 1987, Nebraska Symposium on Motivation. Nebraska Symposium on Motivation.

[42]  David W. Stephens,et al.  On economically tracking a variable environment , 1987 .

[43]  J. Gibbon,et al.  Tracking a fluctuating environment: a study of sampling , 1988, Animal Behaviour.

[44]  A. Logue Research on self-control: An integrating framework , 1988, Behavioral and Brain Sciences.

[45]  Daniel R. Papaj,et al.  ECOLOGICAL AND EVOLUTIONARY ASPECTS OF LEARNING IN PHYTOPHAGOUS INSECTS , 1989 .

[46]  D. Stephens Variance and the Value of Information , 1989, The American Naturalist.

[47]  M. West-Eberhard Phenotypic Plasticity and the Origins of Diversity , 1989 .

[48]  S. Stearns The Evolutionary Significance of Phenotypic PlasticityPhenotypic sources of variation among organisms can be described by developmental switches and reaction norms , 1989 .

[49]  D. Stephens Change, regularity, and value in the evolution of animal learning , 1991 .