Short term memory for behavior in the Bottlenose Dolphin (Turisops truncates)

Abstract

We tested an adult female bottlenose dolphin's ability to repeat self-performed behaviors after a delay interval. Her memory fidelity was tested using four sets of increasingly long delay intervals. Repeat performance decreased as length of delay increased. However, the dolphin's repeat performance was significantly greater than would be expected by chance at all delay intervals tested (up to 120 seconds). Another study tested the dolphin's ability to transfer her delayed repeat ability to five behaviors not previously tested after incrementally increasing delay intervals. The dolphin was able to repeat three behaviors without error. A post-test analysis characterized the dolphin's posture and any behaviors occurring during delay intervals, in an attempt to identify memory strategies utilized by the dolphin. A final experiment introduced a distracter task, paddle pressing, during the delay interval, to study interference effects. Paddle pressing disrupted the dolphin's memory, but not so much that she remembered nothing