Teaching in honey bees
Teaching is widespread throughout the human’s species, however for other organisms, while social learning is commonly found, it is not currently clear how common teaching behaviours are within other organisms. Furthermore, the research that has been conducted tends to surround animals, for instance, Meerkats as they learn to defend themselves against scorpions (Thornton & McAuliffe, 2006) or the ability for New Caledonian Crows to learn to shape hooks to use as tools (Weir, Chappell, & Kacelnik, 2002). This may be due to the fact that for learning to be acknowledged as teaching, it must meet the definition developed by (Caro & Hauser, 1992). Their research indicates that teaching must firstly, modify the behaviour of …show more content…
A note requirement is that the 'Teacher 'only performs trophallaxis in the presence of its Naive candidate. Finally, Trophallaxis provides a Naive bee with the knowledge to go out and complete a task, that would be otherwise impossible without learning it itself (Caro & Hauser, 1992). While it is unclear it the process is Emulation or teaching or plausibly a Combination both of these factors. What is evident is that bees despite their brain size are capable of display a range of very complex behaviours which may include teaching, a feature that is very rarely found outside of …show more content…
Firstly, acting as a control condition the bees will be allowed to act as if they normally would within a normal foraging condition. However, for this condition, the bees will be trained to perform the PER response to a natural floral odour known as phenylacetaldehyde, and the hive will be scented with a non-floral chemical. This condition will run for 20 days and will be monitored for three hours per day.
The second condition, also running for 20 days will spray the hive with the chemical linalool, another floral scented chemical and a small amount of nectar. The initial hive odour shall remain the same in this condition. The final two conditions shall introduce a small apparatus into the hive set up with a small motion sensor that sprays a floral odour. The bees will also have access to the same Phenylacetaldehyde chemical seen in the control condition as it acts as a social learning element in this condition. Though it will be moved from its original location to reduce the roles of the waggle dance and memory in
Teaching is widespread throughout the human’s species, however for other organisms, while social learning is commonly found, it is not currently clear how common teaching behaviours are within other organisms. Furthermore, the research that has been conducted tends to surround animals, for instance, Meerkats as they learn to defend themselves against scorpions (Thornton & McAuliffe, 2006) or the ability for New Caledonian Crows to learn to shape hooks to use as tools (Weir, Chappell, & Kacelnik, 2002). This may be due to the fact that for learning to be acknowledged as teaching, it must meet the definition developed by (Caro & Hauser, 1992). Their research indicates that teaching must firstly, modify the behaviour of …show more content…
A note requirement is that the 'Teacher 'only performs trophallaxis in the presence of its Naive candidate. Finally, Trophallaxis provides a Naive bee with the knowledge to go out and complete a task, that would be otherwise impossible without learning it itself (Caro & Hauser, 1992). While it is unclear it the process is Emulation or teaching or plausibly a Combination both of these factors. What is evident is that bees despite their brain size are capable of display a range of very complex behaviours which may include teaching, a feature that is very rarely found outside of …show more content…
Firstly, acting as a control condition the bees will be allowed to act as if they normally would within a normal foraging condition. However, for this condition, the bees will be trained to perform the PER response to a natural floral odour known as phenylacetaldehyde, and the hive will be scented with a non-floral chemical. This condition will run for 20 days and will be monitored for three hours per day.
The second condition, also running for 20 days will spray the hive with the chemical linalool, another floral scented chemical and a small amount of nectar. The initial hive odour shall remain the same in this condition. The final two conditions shall introduce a small apparatus into the hive set up with a small motion sensor that sprays a floral odour. The bees will also have access to the same Phenylacetaldehyde chemical seen in the control condition as it acts as a social learning element in this condition. Though it will be moved from its original location to reduce the roles of the waggle dance and memory in