Results
Test Results
Each macaw was tested three times: 18 total sessions, obtaining 7 out of 18 correct responses (38.89%).
In 60% of wrong responses, the macaws copied the conspecific demonstrating an action instead (following their expectation instead of the command given, shown in yellow in the table).
Two individuals showed promising results, with Gargamel responding correctly in all three trials, and Long John responding correctly in two out of three. However, not enough data was obtained to perform analyses at the individual level.
Group wise, no statistical significance was found that the macaws performed differently from chance level (binomial test, p > 0.05).
Violation of Expectation Effect
Macaws took significantly longer to respond with a behavior in unexpected repeat trials (Wilcoxon signed-rank test, p = 0.031). On average, individuals took 0.38 seconds to respond with a behavior in an expected situation, and 1.04 seconds in an unexpected situation.
All individuals showed an increase in gaze duration when faced with the unexpected repeat command, in comparison with the expected copy command.
Macaws who performed better in the test also showed a bigger difference (Gargamel, 1.57 s) in gaze duration, while the individual whose difference was the smallest (Mr. Huang, 0.06 s) responded all three testing trials by copying the conspecific’s actions instead.
Average time spent looking at the expected hand command
(copy) and at the unexpected hand command (repeat)
