Incidental memory in dogs (Canis familiaris): adaptive behavioral solution at an unexpected memory test
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Memory processing in nonhuman animals has been typically tested in situations where the animals are repeatedly trained to retrieve their memory trace, such as delayed matching to sample, serial probe recognition, etc. In contrast, how they utilize incidentally formed memory traces is not well investigated except in rodents. We examined whether domestic dogs could solve an unexpected test based on a single past experience. In Experiment 1, leashed dogs were led to 4 open, baited containers and allowed to eat from 2 of them (Exposure phase). After a walk outside for more than 10 min, during which time the containers were replaced with new identical ones, the dogs were unexpectedly returned to the site and unleashed for free exploration (test phase). Eleven out of 12 dogs first visited one of the containers from which they had not eaten. In Experiment 2, two containers had food in them, one had a nonedible object, and the last one was empty. Dogs visited all 4 containers and were allowed to eat one of the food rewards in the Exposure phase. In the test phase, unleashed dogs first visited the previously baited container from which they had not eaten significantly more often than chance. These results demonstrate that in an unexpected, test dogs may retrieve "what" and "where" information about seen (now invisible) items from incidental memory formed during a single past experience.
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Multiple non-human species are able to encode and recall incidental information within remembered events.
“These studies demonstrate that multiple non-human species are able to encode and recall incidental information within remembered events, such as spatial locations [80,81,83,93,97,98], visual markers [92], the identity of experimenters [83], the presence (or absence) of food [74,82], odour cues [94], as well as aspects of their own [79–81,93,95] and other’s behaviour [96].”
From Is episodic-like memory <i>like</i> episodic memory? (2024) · cites this paper as [97]
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- Authors
- Fujita, K., Morisaki, A., Takaoka, A., Maeda, T., & Hori, Y.
- Affiliations
- Kyoto University (JP)
- Japan Society for the Promotion of Science (JP)
- Corresponding author
- Fujita, Kazuo
- Venue
- Animal Cognition
- Published
- 2012-07-08
- Volume
- 15
- Issue
- 6
- Pages
- 1055-1063
- ISSN
- 1435-9448 (ISSN-L)
- 1435-9456
- OpenAlex
- W2149217408
- Cited by
- 46
- References
- 42
- Citations by year
- 2025: 4 · 2024: 3 · 2023: 4 · 2022: 6 · 2021: 2 · 2020: 3 · 2019: 4 · 2018: 3 · 2017: 3 · 2016: 2 · 2015: 1 · 2014: 7 · 2013: 4
- FWCI
- 1.96
- Type
- journal article
- Language
- en
- Open access
- Licence
- www.springer.com/tdm (tdm)
- Locations
- Animal Cognition (publishedVersion)
- PubMed (publishedVersion)
- Institutional Repositories DataBase (IRDB) (submittedVersion)
- Kyoto University Research Information Repository (Kyoto University) (submittedVersion)
- Funders
- Japan Society for the Promotion of Science (20220004)
- Topics
- Life Sciences › Neuroscience › Cognitive Neuroscience › Memory Processes and Influences
- Life Sciences › Biochemistry, Genetics and Molecular Biology › Genetics › Human-Animal Interaction Studies
- Life Sciences › Neuroscience › Cognitive Neuroscience › Memory and Neural Mechanisms
- Keywords
- incidental memory, dogs, memory retrieval, spatial memory, object location memory, free exploration
- MeSH terms
- Animals, Behavior, Animal, Dogs, Feeding Behavior, Female, Male, Memory
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