| Abstract: | Field experiments can provide compelling demonstrations of social learning in wild populations. Social learning has been experimentally
demonstrated in at least 23 field experiments, in 20 species, covering a range of contexts, such as foraging preferences and
techniques, habitat choice, and predator avoidance. We review experimental approaches taken in the field and with wild animals
brought into captivity and note how these approaches can be extended. Relocating individuals, introducing trained individual
demonstrators or novel behaviors into a population, or providing demonstrator-manipulated artifacts can establish whether
and how a particular act can be socially transmitted in the wild and can help elucidate the benefits of social learning. The
type, strength, and consistency of presented social information can be varied, and the provision of conditions favoring the
performance of an act can both establish individual discovery rates and help determine whether social information is needed
for acquisition. By blocking particular avenues of social transmission or removing key individuals, routes of transmission
in wild populations can be investigated. Manipulation of conditions proposed to favor social learning can test mathematical
models of the evolution of social learning. We illustrate how field experiments are a viable, vital, and informative approach
to the study of social learning. |
