鷄の空間學習と大きさ恒常性

抄録

E. C. Tolman has found that mice formed the spatial learning very easily. The author supposed that hens form the spatial learning more easily than the mice ; and he anticipated that the spatial learning interacts with the problem of the visual perception in the hen. The author endeavored to study the relation between the spatial learning and the size constancy in the hen.
(Control Group) Two hens were trained to go to F2 in Fig. 2. Then, an effort was made to train them to start from the southern entrance but they still chose F2. (Fig. 5) Successive experiments indicated that the sense of smell and light rays had no influeuce on the choice of F2. The author studied the relation between the choice of F2 and the nest box and found a close relation between them. As was discovered by these experiments, the hens were believed to choose the food location on the right as viewed from the nest box. For example, the nest box and the apparatus were moved as in Fig. 7, and the hens still chose F1. Then the author connected nest box to the southern entrance ; but again they still chose F1. The author concluded by these experiments that the hens can learn the food place very easily depending on some visual cues, and in these experiments, their decisive cue was their nest box.
(Experimental Group) Two hens, el, and e3, made up this group. E1, was trained to choose the bigger card (8cm×8cm), and e3, learned to choose the smaller card (7cm×7cm) in Fig. 4. The smaller card was placed nearer than the bigger card to the starting entrance. Their distant ratio from the starting entrance was always 3 : 4. At first they were made to start from the northern entrance in the nest box. At A, the positive card of el was placed in his trained place (the palce 30cm from the northern entrance), and at B, the positive card of e3 was placed in his trained place at A, e1 chose the positive card more frequently than at B ; and at B, e3 chose the positive card more frequently than at A. These results indicated that the positive card was more easily chosen at the accustomed place. Then the hens were made to start from the southern entrance. (Fig. 9). In this case also, they chose the positive card more frequently at the accustomed place (30cm from northern entrance). Next, when the author removed the nest box from their visual field, their responses were very much distturbed. The author connected the nest box to the southern entrance. At the place 30cm from the nest box the hens chose the positive card frequently than the place 30cm from northern entrance (the original place). From these experiments, the author concluded that, if there was some cue in the visual field, the problem of visual perception will interact with the spatial learning.
In these experiments, the hens' cue was the nest box. The author thinks, however, if we put them into the homogeneous experimental situation, the spatial learning still will interact with the experiment of their size constancy.