Journal of Comparative Psychology 1996, Vol. 110, No. 3, 316-320 Copyright 1996 by the American Psychological Association, Inc. 0735-7036/96/S3.00 BRIEF COMMUNICATION Imitative Learning in Male Japanese Quail (Coturnix japonica) Using the Two-Action Method Ghana K. Akins and Thomas R. Zentall University of Kentucky The study of imitative learning in animals has suffered from the presence of a number of confounding motivational and attentional factors (e.g., social facilitation and stimulus en- hancement). The two-action method avoids these problems by exposing observers to dem- onstrators performing a response (e.g., operating a treadle) using 1 of 2 distinctive topogra- phies (e.g., by pecking or by stepping). Japanese quail (Coturnix japonica) observers exposed to conspecific demonstrators showed a high correlation between the topography of the response they observed and the response they performed. These data provide strong evidence for the existence of true imitative learning in an active, precocious bird under conditions that control for alternative accounts. The study of social learning (or imitation) in animals has been complicated both by alternative definitions and incon- sistent terminology (see, for example, Galef, 1988; Zentall, 1996). Furthermore, several socially influenced, motiva- tional, and perceptual factors have been identified that, although they do not qualify as true imitative learning, could indirectly facilitate the acquisition and performance of an observed response (Thorpe, 1963). For example, if observation of a response made by a conspecific facilitates the acquisition of that response, rel- ative to a trial-and-error-learning control, it may not be possible to attribute that learning to true imitation because it is possible that response acquisition was influenced by the mere presence of the other animal (i.e., social facilitation, Zajonc, 1965). Alternatively, if the target response involves a manipu- landum, such as a bar-press response, exposing an observer to a bar-pressing demonstrator may merely draw the observ- er's attention to the location of the moving bar (i.e., local enhancement, Thorpe, 1963). To control for local enhance- ment, the demonstrator's manipulandum can be separated from that of the observer by the use of duplicate cages (Warden & Jackson, 1935; Zentall & Levine, 1972). In this way the locus of the observed behavior is different from that of the target behavior. However, when the duplicate cages are used, the similarity between the demonstrator's and observer's manipulandum may be sufficient for attention to Ghana K. Akins and Thomas R. Zentall, Department of Psychol- ogy, University of Kentucky. This research was supported by National Institute of Mental Health Grant MH 45979 and National Science Foundation Grants BNS-9019080 and IBN 9414589. We thank Mark Klassen for help in training subjects and collecting test data. Correspondence concerning this article should be addressed to Thomas R. Zentall, Department of Psychology, University of Kentucky, Lexington, Kentucky 40506-0044. Electronic mail may be sent via Internet to zentall@pop.uky.edu. generalize from one to the other (i.e., stimulus enhance- ment, Galef, 1988; Spence, 1937). One procedure that can control for all of these factors was suggested by Galef, Manzig, and Field (1986, on the basis of an original experiment by Dawson & Foss, 1965). Daw- son and Foss found that when budgerigars learned to re- move a flat lid from a food cup, they did so in one of three distinctive ways. After conspecifics were exposed to these demonstrators, Dawson and Foss found that each of the observers removed the lid in the same way that they had observed it being done. This procedure has become known as the two-action method (Whiten & Ham, 1992). In a variation on this procedure (called the bidirectional control procedure, Heyes & Dawson, 1990), demonstrators were explicitly trained to push an overhead pole either to the right or to the left. When observers that had been exposed to the demonstrators were given access to the pole, they tended to push the pole in the same direction as their demonstrator. Recently, Zentall, Sutton, and Sherburne (in press) noted that the ideal control condition should rule out observed differences in the movement of the manipulandum by the two groups. Any difference in the way the manipulandum moved could serve as a distinctive perceptual cue. For example, Dawson and Foss's (1965) lid-removing demon- strators caused the lid to move differently, relative to the food cup, depending on whether the lid was pushed off, pulled off, or twisted off. Similarly, Heyes and Dawson's (1990) right-pole-pushing demonstrators always pushed their pole toward a particular wall of the chamber and that location could have served as a distinctive cue. Zentall et al. (in press) trained demonstrator pigeons to operate a treadle for food reinforcement with one of two distinctive response topographies (pecking or stepping). Af- ter exposing conspecifics to performing demonstrators, the observers were permitted to respond to the treadle for food, using either topography. A significant correlation was found between the observer's performance and the behavior that they observed. Although the results reported by Zentall et 316