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Assessment of Social Transmission of Food Preferences Behaviors
Published on: January 25, 2018
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Mouse pups discriminate food gnawed by conspecifics
1Dipartimento di Biologia, Sezione di Anatomia Comparata, Università degli Studi di Milano, Via Celoria 26, 20133 Milan, Italy.
Behavioural Processes
|June 5, 2014
Summary
Young mice avoid food pellets with scent cues from adult mice, preferring fresh food. However, familiarity with the scent donor can reduce this avoidance in older mice.
Area of Science:
- Animal Behavior
- Olfactory Cues
- Rodent Studies
Background:
- Social learning and olfactory cues play a role in rodent feeding habits.
- Neophobia, the fear of novel stimuli, can influence food choices in young animals.
Purpose of the Study:
- To investigate the influence of conspecific olfactory cues on food pellet selection in young albino mice.
- To determine if age and familiarity with scent donors affect the avoidance of gnawed food pellets.
Main Methods:
- Albino mice (18 and 24 days old) were presented with intact and conspecific-gnawed food pellets.
- Experiment 2 involved treating pellets with garlic extract to assess responses to aversive compounds.
Main Results:
- Mice of both ages preferred intact pellets over gnawed ones, indicating avoidance of residual cues.
- Familiarity with the scent donor positively influenced pellet preference in 24-day-old mice.
- Younger mice showed an initial preference for dam-gnawed pellets treated with garlic extract, but overall avoidance persisted.
Conclusions:
- Mice exhibit avoidance of food associated with conspecifics, potentially due to a tendency to avoid crowded feeding sites.
- This avoidance behavior appears inversely related to neophobia.
- Behavioral responses to olfactory cues may differ between mice and rats.
