Appetitive learning of odours with different behavioural meaning in moths

Moth behaviour is to a great extent guided by olfactory stimuli with different relevance. We investigated whether olfactory learning of odours is influenced by the behavioural significance of the odorant. In proboscis extension conditioning experiments species-specific sex pheromones, which normally elicit an innate behaviour in males, and a flower odour were used as olfactory stimuli. After 10 conditioning trials, both sexes showed similar response levels to individual pheromone components and to the flower odour geraniol. However, when the female gland extract was used as conditioning stimulus, the response level was significantly lower than that for geraniol in both sexes. Significant learning nevertheless occurred in females, but not in males. Experiments with different numbers of training trials revealed that, in females, fewer learning trials with individual pheromone components were necessary for significant memory formation than in males.