Study: Treats might mask animal intelligence

MAY 14, 2019

by Johns Hopkins University

Rewards are necessary for learning, but may actually mask true knowledge, finds a new Johns Hopkins University study with rodents and ferrets.

The findings, published May 14 in Nature Communications, show a distinction between knowledge and performance, and provide insight into how environment can affect the two.

"Most learning research focuses on how humans and other animals learn 'content' or knowledge. Here, we suggest that there are two parallel learning processes: one for content and one for context, or environment. If we can separate how these two pathways work, perhaps we can find ways to improve performance," says Kishore Kuchibhotla, an assistant professor in The Johns Hopkins University's department of psychological and brain sciences and the study's lead author.

While researchers have known that the presence of reinforcement, or reward, can change how animals behave, it's been unclear exactly how rewards affect learning versus performance.

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