Monkey plays Pac-Man with compositional strategies and hierarchical decision-making

Area of Science:

• Cognitive Science
• Animal Behavior
• Neuroscience

Background:

• Humans utilize heuristic strategies to simplify complex decision-making.
• Demonstrating such advanced cognitive strategies in animals has been challenging.
• Heuristics represent a sophisticated form of intelligence.

Purpose of the Study:

• To investigate whether non-human primates can employ heuristic strategies.
• To model the decision-making processes of macaque monkeys playing a complex game.
• To explore a novel paradigm for studying animal cognition.

Main Methods:

• Macaque monkeys were trained to play the video game Pac-Man.
• A strategy-based hierarchical decision-making model was developed.
• The model's accuracy in describing monkey behavior was evaluated.

Main Results:

• The decision-making model accurately described monkey behavior in Pac-Man (>90% accuracy).
• Monkeys adopted the 'take-the-best' heuristic, prioritizing one strategy at a time.
• Compound strategies were formed by combining basic strategies for specific game scenarios.

Conclusions:

• Macaque monkeys exhibit advanced cognitive abilities, including the use of heuristic strategies.
• The Pac-Man paradigm offers a quantifiable approach to studying animal decision-making.
• This research provides new insights into the evolution of advanced cognition.