Chapter 12 - The Evolution of Imitative Learning

• Published in: Social Learning In Animals pp. 245 - 265
• Main Author: Moore, Bruce R.
• Format: Book Chapter
• Language: English
• Published: Academic Press 1996
• ISBN: 9780122739651; 0122739655
• DOI: 10.1016/B978-012273965-1/50013-3

Movement imitation can be defined as the copying of novel, non-instinctive responses in the absence of explicit reinforcement, and in situations where simpler explanations are untenable. This chapter describes three attempts to demonstrate such imitation, studies involving three very different creatures. It then considers the paths along which avian and mammalian imitation may have evolved and summarizes evidence that these processes are not homologous. It ends by proposing an evolutionary tree that shows the possible origins of these and other forms of learning and conditioning. As evident from the conclusion of the paper, avian and mammalian imitations are not homologous and that does not imply the absence of any common antecedent. It is certainly possible, perhaps even probable, that all forms of learning are related. Indeed, it should be possible to draw an evolutionary linking them all and showing the paths through which they came into being. It is nevertheless a beginning, and offers an evolutionary alternative to the prevailing but anachronistic paradigm in which most forms of learning are still treated as separate creations—much as species were treated by pre-Darwinian biologists.