Data from: Cross-modal recognition of familiar conspecifics in goats

When identifying other individuals, animals may match current cues with stored information about that individual from the same sensory modality. Animals may also be able to combine current information with previously acquired information from other sensory modalities, indicating that they possess complex cognitive templates of individuals that are independent of modality. We investigated whether goats (Capra hircus) possess cross-modal representations (auditory–visual) of conspecifics. We presented subjects with recorded conspecific calls broadcast equidistant between two individuals, one of which was the caller. We found that, when presented with a stablemate and another herd member, goats looked towards the caller sooner and for longer than the non-caller, regardless of caller identity. By contrast, when choosing between two herd members, other than their stablemate, goats did not show a preference to look towards the caller. Goats show cross-modal recognition of close social partners, but not of less familiar herd members. Goats may employ inferential reasoning when identifying conspecifics, potentially facilitating individual identification based on incomplete information. Understanding the prevalence of cross-modal recognition and the degree to which different sensory modalities are integrated provides insight into how animals learn about other individuals, and the evolution of animal communication.

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Pitcher et al, Cross-modal recognition in goats - playback dataGoat MM Data.xlsx

在识别其他个体时，动物能够将当前感官模态下的线索与存储的关于该个体的信息进行匹配。动物亦能将当前信息与先前从其他感官模态中获取的信息相结合，这表明它们拥有独立于感官模态的复杂认知模板。本研究旨在探究山羊（Capra hircus）是否具备跨感官模态（听觉-视觉）的同种个体表征。我们向受试者播放了记录的同种个体叫声，这些叫声在两个个体之间等距离传播，其中一人为发声者。我们发现，当面对稳定伴侣和另一群成员时，山羊相较于非发声者，更早且持续时间更长地朝向发声者望去，无论发声者身份如何。相反，当在两个非稳定伴侣的群成员之间选择时，山羊并未表现出朝向发声者的偏好。山羊能够识别亲密的社会伙伴，但不能识别不太熟悉的群成员。山羊在识别同种个体时可能运用推理能力，这或许有助于基于不完整信息进行个体识别。了解跨感官识别的普遍性以及不同感官模态整合的程度，有助于揭示动物如何了解其他个体，以及动物交流的进化过程。