ORIGINAL PAPER Switching strategies: a dolphin’s use of passive and active acoustics to imitate motor actions Kelly Jaakkola • Emily Guarino • Mandy Rodriguez • Jane Hecksher Received: 8 March 2012 / Revised: 25 January 2013 / Accepted: 25 January 2013 / Published online: 7 February 2013 Ó Springer-Verlag Berlin Heidelberg 2013 Abstract Scientists have long debated the extent to which animals can imitate. Observations of bottlenose dolphins suggest a sophisticated capacity for social imita- tion, but little is known about the nature of these abilities. Here, we explore the behavioral mechanisms underlying a dolphin’s ability to copy motor actions while blindfolded (i.e., wearing eyecups). When a dolphin was asked to imitate a dolphin, a human, and then another dolphin blindfolded, his accuracy remained relatively consistent across models. However, his blindfolded echolocation dramatically increased when copying a human as compared to other dolphins, suggesting he actively switched between strategies: recognizing behaviors via characteristic sounds when possible, but via echolocation for the more novel sounding behaviors of the human. Such flexibility in changing perceptual routes demonstrates that the dolphin’s imitation was not automatically elicited, but rather results from an intentional, problem-solving approach to imitation. Keywords Dolphins Á Imitation Á Echolocation Á Response facilitation Introduction The ability to imitate is fundamental to human nature. From infancy on, humans habitually copy behaviors of every type: vocal and motor, old and new, immediate and delayed, across a variety of contexts (Meltzoff 1996). Imitation is an ingrained part of how we learn, and is believed to be one of the primary cognitive building blocks underlying the evolution of such human-defining charac- teristics as culture, language, and the ability to understand other minds (Hurley and Chater 2005; Meltzoff 1996; Tomasello 1999; Tomasello et al. 1993). Given imitation’s central role in human cognitive evolu- tion and development, it is perhaps not surprising that decades of research and vigorous debate have been devoted to dis- covering the extent to which this ability is shared—or more accurately, not shared—among non-human animals (Bates and Byrne 2010; Galef 1988; Whiten and Ham 1992). What is more surprising is that this research has suggested that the animal most similar to humans in imitative ability may not be found among our closest primate relatives, but rather among cetaceans (Herman 2002; Whiten 2001)—a group of animals that diverged from the primate line approximately 90–95 million years ago and adapted to radically different environ- ments, body morphologies, and neuroanatomies (Bromham et al. 1999; Marino 2002). Specifically, bottlenose dolphins (Tursiops truncatus) are adept at copying both vocal and motor behaviors, including the sounds of conspecifics (e.g., Janik 2000; Tyack 1986), computer-generated sounds (Caldwell and Caldwell 1972; Reiss and McCowan 1993; Richards et al. 1984), and motor behaviors of conspecifics, humans, and other animals (Herman 2002; Jaakkola et al. 2010a; Bauer and Johnson 1994; Tayler and Saayman 1973). A second delphinid species—killer whales (Orcinus orca)— have also recently shown success at imitating motor actions (Abramson et al. 2013), raising the possibility that this ability may be widespread within the family Delphinidae. Because dolphins are so far removed from humans evolutionarily, any shared cognitive abilities are much Electronic supplementary material The online version of this article (doi:10.1007/s10071-013-0605-3) contains supplementary material, which is available to authorized users. K. Jaakkola (&) Á E. Guarino Á M. Rodriguez Á J. Hecksher Dolphin Research Center, 58901 Overseas Highway, Grassy Key, FL 33050, USA e-mail: kelly@dolphins.org 123 Anim Cogn (2013) 16:701–709 DOI 10.1007/s10071-013-0605-3