Systematic Analysis of Pigeons’ Discrimination of Pixelated Stimuli: A Hierarchical Pattern Recognition System Is Not Identifiable

Pigeons learned to discriminate two different patterns displayed with miniature light-emitting diode arrays. They were then tested with 84 interspersed, non-reinforced degraded pattern pairs. Choices ranged between 100% and 50% for one or other of the patterns. Stimuli consisting of few pixels yield...

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Bibliographic Details
Published in:Scientific reports 2019-09, Vol.9 (1), p.13929-24, Article 13929
Main Authors: Delius, Juan D., Delius, Julia A. M.
Format: Article
Language:English
Subjects:
631/378/2613/2615
631/477
Animals
Birds
Columbidae - physiology
Columbiformes
Discrimination, Psychological
Humanities and Social Sciences
Learning
Mesencephalon
Mesencephalon - physiology
multidisciplinary
Pattern recognition
Pattern recognition systems
Photic Stimulation
Science
Science (multidisciplinary)
Synapses
Training
Vision, Ocular
Visual discrimination
Visual Perception
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Summary:Pigeons learned to discriminate two different patterns displayed with miniature light-emitting diode arrays. They were then tested with 84 interspersed, non-reinforced degraded pattern pairs. Choices ranged between 100% and 50% for one or other of the patterns. Stimuli consisting of few pixels yielded low choice scores whereas those consisting of many pixels yielded a broad range of scores. Those patterns with a high number of pixels coinciding with those of the rewarded training stimulus were preferred and those with a high number of pixels coinciding with the non-rewarded training pattern were avoided; a discrimination index based on this correlated 0.74 with the pattern choices. Pixels common to both training patterns had a minimal influence. A pixel-by-pixel analysis revealed that eight pixels of one pattern and six pixels of the other pattern played a prominent role in the pigeons’ choices. These pixels were disposed in four and two clusters of neighbouring locations. A summary index calculated on this basis still only yielded a weak 0.73 correlation. The individual pigeons’ data furthermore showed that these clusters were a mere averaging mirage. The pigeons’ performance depends on deep learning in a midbrain-based multimillion synapse neuronal network. Pixelated visual patterns should be helpful when simulating perception of patterns with artificial networks.
ISSN:2045-2322
2045-2322
DOI:10.1038/s41598-019-50212-1