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Applying bubbles to localize features that control pigeons' visual discrimination behavior
Journal article   Peer reviewed

Applying bubbles to localize features that control pigeons' visual discrimination behavior

Brett M Gibson, Edward A Wasserman, Frédéric Gosselin and Philippe G Schyns
Journal of experimental psychology. Animal behavior processes, Vol.31(3), pp.376-382
07/2005
DOI: 10.1037/0097-7403.31.3.376
PMID: 16045392

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Abstract

The authors trained pigeons to discriminate images of human faces that displayed: (a) a happy or a neutral expression or (b) a man or a woman. After training the pigeons, the authors used a new procedure called Bubbles to pinpoint the features of the faces that were used to make these discriminations. Bubbles revealed that the features used to discriminate happy from neutral faces were different from those used to discriminate male from female faces. Furthermore, the features that pigeons used to make each of these discriminations overlapped those used by human observers in a companion study (F. Gosselin & P.G. Schyns, 2001). These results show that the Bubbles technique can be effectively applied to nonhuman animals to isolate the functional features of complex visual stimuli.
Humans Male Pattern Recognition, Visual - physiology Columbidae - physiology Emotions Discrimination Learning - physiology Behavior, Animal Gender Identity Animals Photic Stimulation - methods Female Face Transfer (Psychology) - physiology

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