Ordinality and inferential abilities of a grey parrot (Psittacus erithacus)
Publication Type: |
Journal Article |
Year of Publication: |
2006 |
Authors: |
I.M. Pepperberg |
Publication/Journal: |
Journal of Comparative Psychology |
Keywords: |
animal vocalization, animals, association learning, color perception, comprehension, concept formation, discrimination learning, mathematics, parrots, problem solving, psychophysics, size perception, symbolism, visual pattern recognition |
ISBN: |
1939-2087 0735-7036 |
Abstract:
A grey parrot (Psittacus erithacus), able to label the color of the bigger or smaller object in a pair (I. M. Pepperberg & M. V. Brezinsky, 1991), to vocally quantify < or =6 item sets (including heterogeneous subsets; I. M. Pepperberg, 1994), and separately trained to identify Arabic numerals 1-6 with the same vocal English labels but not to associate Arabic numbers with their relevant physical quantities, was shown pairs of Arabic numbers or an Arabic numeral and a set of objects and was asked for the color of the bigger or smaller one. The parrot's success showed he (a) understood number symbols as abstract representations of real-world collections, (b) inferred the relationship between the Arabic number and the quantity via stimulus equivalence, and (c) understood the ordinal relationship of his numbers.