Social exploitation of intermittently available foods and the social reinstatement of food preference

To determine whether Norway rats, Rattus norvegicus, could use socially acq uired information to track recurrences of an intermittently available food (experiment 1), we allowed observer rats to interact every 2-3 days with de monstrator rats fed one of two diets, then determined the amount of each di et eaten by observers. We found that observer rats showed repeated signific ant increases in their preferences for foods their respective demonstrators had eaten. Because social interactions repeatedly enhanced preference for a food, we reasoned that after the socially induced food preference of an a nimal (A1) had waned, that preference might be reinstated in Al by interact ion with a conspecific (A2) in whom Al had previously induced a preference for the food. In experiment 2, we demonstrated such social reinstatement of a food preference. (C) 2000 The Association for the Study of Animal Behavi our.