IMITATION IN RATS (RATTUS-NORVEGICUS) - THE ROLE OF DEMONSTRATOR ACTION

In a bidirectional control procedure, rats had their first opportunity to push a joystick immediately after observing, from an adjacent comp artment, the joystick moving 50 times either to the right or to the le ft, with each movement signalling the delivery of inaccessible food. H alf of these animals observed the joystick moving automatically, and h alf observed a conspecific demonstrator pushing the joystick. When the y were given direct access to the joystick, the observers were rewarde d for both left and right pushes. Rats that had observed the joystick moving through the action of a conspecific demonstrator showed a respo nse bias in favour of the observed direction of joystick movement (Exp eriment 1), while rats that had observed the joystick moving automatic ally, either in the presence or absence of a passive conspecific, did not show observation-consistent responding (Experiments 1 and 2). Thes e results apparently confirm that rats are capable of imitation or obs ervational learning.