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Pigeons' performance in the number-left task: Associative or computational mechanism?

Catarina Soares¹, Armando Machado², Marco Vasconcelos²

¹School of Psychology, University of Minho, Braga, Portugal.

Journal of the Experimental Analysis of Behavior

|July 17, 2025

Summary

This summary is machine-generated.

Pigeons demonstrate consistent performance in a number-left task, suggesting a computational mechanism underlies their numerosity discrimination abilities. This finding holds true even when numerical ranges are expanded, indicating robust cognitive processes.

Keywords:

associative mechanism computational mechanism number‐left task numerosity pigeons

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Area of Science:

Cognitive psychology
Animal behavior
Comparative cognition

Background:

The number-left task assesses numerical discrimination in animals.
Understanding the cognitive mechanisms behind numerical tasks is crucial for comparative cognition research.

Purpose of the Study:

To investigate the underlying mechanisms of pigeons' performance in the number-left task.
To determine if performance is affected by the range and overlap of numerical stimuli.

Main Methods:

Pigeons were trained and tested on a number-left task with varying numerical ranges and anchor points.
Experiments involved forced and choice trials, as well as probe trials with intermediate numerosities.
Generalization gradients and computational models were used to analyze performance.

Main Results:

Pigeons' performance was consistent across different experimental conditions, including varied anchor numerosities and numerical ranges.
Performance remained similar even when anchor numerosities were farther apart, reducing stimulus overlap.
Results align with predictions from a computational mechanism for numerosity discrimination.

Conclusions:

Pigeons utilize a robust computational mechanism for numerosity discrimination.
The findings suggest that this mechanism is not solely dependent on the overlap of generalization gradients around anchor stimuli.
This study contributes to understanding the fundamental cognitive processes of numerical cognition in non-human animals.