Data from: Age-dependent social learning in a lizard

Evidence of social learning, whereby the actions of an animal facilitate the acquisition of new information by another, is taxonomically biased towards mammals, especially primates, and birds. However, social learning need not be limited to group-living animals because species with less interaction can still benefit from learning about potential predators, food sources, rivals and mates. We trained male skinks (Eulamprus quoyii), a mostly solitary lizard from eastern Australia, in a two-step foraging task. Lizards belonging to ‘young’ and ‘old’ age classes were presented with a novel instrumental task (displacing a lid) and an association task (reward under blue lid). We did not find evidence for age-dependent learning of the instrumental task; however, young males in the presence of a demonstrator learnt the association task faster than young males without a demonstrator, whereas old males in both treatments had similar success rates. We present the first evidence of age-dependent social learning in a lizard and suggest that the use of social information for learning may be more widespread than previously believed.

Usage Notes
task1_dataTrial by trial data for all lizards in instrumental task (task 1). "Liz.ID" is a combination of toe-clips and PIT tags. "Dem.ID" is the ID of the demonstrating lizard. "Batch" is the batch number (three-level factor) each lizard was associated with. "Treat" two-level factor of treatment - SL = Social demonstration, C = Control. "Age" - two-level factor identifying age class of lizard. "LT" are learning trials - i.e. trials until the lizard learnt. "correct.incorrect" - whether the lizard flipped the yellow lid successfully (1) or unsuccessfully (0). "Lat_min1" - time from start of trial to the point when the lizard successfully flipped the yellow lid. "Learn" two level factor identifying whether the lizard learn the task (1) or not (0). 'trial' trial number for each lizard. "juldat" is the jillian date that each trial was run.data_T1_final.csvdata_T2_finalTrial by trial data for all lizards in association task (task 2). "Liz.ID" is a combination of toe-clips and PIT tags. "Dem.ID" is the ID of the demonstrating lizard. "Batch" is the batch number (three-level factor) each lizard was associated with. "Treat" two-level factor of treatment - SL = Social demonstration, C = Control. "Age" - two-level factor identifying age class of lizard. "LT" are learning trials - i.e. trials until the lizard learnt. "correct.incorrect" - whether the lizard flipped the blue lid successfully (1) or unsuccessfully (0). "Lat_Blue.min1" - time from start of trial to the point when the lizard successfully flipped the blue lid. "Learn" two level factor identifying whether the lizard learnt the task (1) or not (0). 'trial' trial number for each lizard. "juldat" is the jillian date that each trial was run. "blue.choice" - whether the lizard choose only the blue lid (1) or whether the lizard choose either the blue then the white or only the white lid (0).

社会学习现象的证据表明，动物的行为能够促进其他动物获取新信息，此现象在分类学上倾向于哺乳动物，尤其是灵长类动物和鸟类。然而，社会学习并非局限于群居动物，那些互动较少的物种仍能从学习潜在捕食者、食物来源、竞争对手和配偶的信息中受益。本研究对来自澳大利亚东部的独居壁虎（Eulamprus quoyii）的雄性个体进行了两步觅食任务的训练。将属于‘年轻’和‘老年’年龄层的壁虎呈现了一种新的工具任务（移动盖子）和一种关联任务（在蓝色盖子下获得奖励）。我们没有发现工具任务存在年龄依赖性学习的证据；然而，在示范者的存在下，年轻雄性壁虎比没有示范者的年轻雄性壁虎更快地学会了关联任务，而在两种处理方法中，老年雄性壁虎的成功率相似。我们首次在壁虎中发现了年龄依赖性的社会学习证据，并提议社会信息的使用在学习的应用上可能比先前所认为的更为普遍。

使用说明

task1_data：所有壁虎在工具任务（任务1）中的逐次试验数据。"Liz.ID"为趾环和PIT标签的组合。"Dem.ID"为示范壁虎的ID。"Batch"为壁虎所属的批次编号（三级因素）。"Treat"为两个水平因素的实验处理 - SL = 社会示范，C = 控制。"Age"为两个水平因素，用于识别壁虎的年龄层。"LT"为学习试验，即壁虎学会任务前的试验次数。"correct.incorrect"表示壁虎是否成功（1）或未成功（0）地翻转了黄色盖子。"Lat_min1"表示从试验开始到壁虎成功翻转黄色盖子的时间。"Learn"为两个水平因素，用于识别壁虎是否学会了任务（1）或未学会（0）。'trial'为每个壁虎的试验编号。"juldat"为每次试验运行的Jillian日期。

data_T1_final.csv：所有壁虎在关联任务（任务2）中的逐次试验数据。"Liz.ID"为趾环和PIT标签的组合。"Dem.ID"为示范壁虎的ID。"Batch"为壁虎所属的批次编号（三级因素）。"Treat"为两个水平因素的实验处理 - SL = 社会示范，C = 控制。"Age"为两个水平因素，用于识别壁虎的年龄层。"LT"为学习试验，即壁虎学会任务前的试验次数。"correct.incorrect"表示壁虎是否成功（1）或未成功（0）地翻转了蓝色盖子。"Lat_Blue.min1"表示从试验开始到壁虎成功翻转蓝色盖子的时间。"Learn"为两个水平因素，用于识别壁虎是否学会了任务（1）或未学会（0）。'trial'为每个壁虎的试验编号。"juldat"为每次试验运行的Jillian日期。"blue.choice"表示壁虎是否仅选择蓝色盖子（1）或选择蓝色然后白色或仅选择白色盖子（0）。