Behavioral reactions to novel food odors by intertidal hermit crabs

Novel food items represent important food resources for generalist scavengers, such as intertidal hermit crabs. For animals that rely heavily on olfaction to mediate foraging, their first encounters with novel food items come from the detection of novel food odors. Although crustaceans have been shown to possess sensory mechanisms for processing novel odors, little is known about the level of stimulus reinforcement needed to maintain behavioral responses to novel food odors upon subsequent exposures. In the context of foraging, reinforcement of a novel food odor comes from feeding on the novel food item after sensory detection of the food item. This study tested the behavioral responses of hermit crabs to a novel food odor over repeated exposures both with and without stimulus reinforcement. The results show that stimulus reinforcement is needed for the animals to maintain their baseline level of behavioral responses to the novel food odors. Animals that were allowed to feed on the novel food item after first exposure (reinforced treatment) maintained strong behavioral reactions to the novel food odor during subsequent exposures. The behavioral reactions of animals that were not allowed to feed on the novel food item after first exposure (unreinforced treatment) rapidly declined.