Watch and Learn

Imagine handing a cell phone to a person who’d never seen one before and had no knowledge of writing—and asking them to send a text message. Without the necessary background knowledge, the task would be impossible, no matter how smart the person was. “There’s just no way they could do it unless someone showed them how,” says Alice Bridges. She’s a cognitive scientist, a researcher who studies thinking and learning, at the University of Sheffield. Her example shows why social learning is so important. It allows people to gain knowledge and skills too complex for an individual to figure out on their own.

Bridges and her team wanted to find out whether bumblebees could also learn this way. First, Bridges had to design a suitable task to test the animals. It needed to be simple enough for a bee to learn by watching—but complicated enough that it was unlikely any bee could figure out the task by itself. The scientists designed a puzzle box containing tasty sugar water. They wanted to see if bees could work out how to open it to get the reward inside. The box had two doors that bees had to push out of the way. The first door blocked the second. To open the box, a bee had to push both doors in the right order. That allowed it to access the sugary treat (see The Buzz on the Puzzle).

Bridges knew from previous experiments that bees could independently figure out how to push one door for a reward. So the researchers wanted to make sure bees couldn’t figure out the two-step puzzle on their own. The team placed a double-door box in an enclosure with a bumblebee colony for 24 days. Not a single bee solved the puzzle. “It was very stark how difficult this was for them,” says Bridges. Would things be different if a “teacher” showed them what to do?

To find out, the researchers trained a group of demonstrator bees to perform the two-step task. The scientists did this by offering two separate rewards—one for each door. Then they gradually got rid of the reward for the first door. “The bees hated that!” says Bridges. “When they stopped getting that reward, some threw a bit of a tantrum and didn’t want to participate anymore.” But eventually, some of the bees realized they had to push the first door and then the second to get the single reward at the end.

Next the researchers paired the trained bees with ones that had never seen the puzzle box. The scientists allowed the pairs to explore the box together repeatedly so the new bees could see the demonstrators solve it. Finally, the untrained bees got a chance to try the puzzle on their own. About one-third of them succeeded: They’d learned how to solve the challenging puzzle just by watching.

Picture this: You hand a cell phone to someone and ask them to send a text message. But that person has never seen a cell phone and has no knowledge of writing. They don’t have the background knowledge they need. So the task would be impossible, no matter how smart the person is. “There’s just no way they could do it unless someone showed them how,” says Alice Bridges. She’s a cognitive scientist at the University of Sheffield, and she studies thinking and learning. Her example shows why social learning is so important. It allows people to gain complex knowledge and skills that they couldn’t figure out alone.

Could bumblebees also learn this way? Bridges and her team wanted to find out. First, Bridges had to design the right task to test the bugs. It needed to be simple enough for a bee to learn by watching. But it had to be too difficult for a bee to figure out alone. The scientists designed a puzzle box. It contained tasty sugar water. They wanted to see if bees could figure out the puzzle to get the reward inside. The box had two doors. Bees had to push them out of the way. The first door blocked the second. To open the box, a bee had to push both doors in the right order. Then it could get the sugary treat (see The Buzz on the Puzzle).

Bridges had done experiments with bees before. She knew they could figure out how to push one door for a reward. The researchers didn’t think bees could figure out the two-step puzzle on their own. But they wanted to make sure. The team placed a double-door box in an enclosure with a bumblebee colony for 24 days. No bee solved the puzzle. “It was very stark how difficult this was for them,” says Bridges. What if a “teacher” showed them what to do? Would things be different?

To find out, the researchers trained a group of demonstrator bees. The scientists taught them to perform the two-step task by offering two separate rewards. Bees got one reward for each door. Then the scientists got rid of the reward for the first door, little by little. “The bees hated that!” says Bridges. “When they stopped getting that reward, some threw a bit of a tantrum and didn’t want to participate anymore.” But over time, some of the bees figured it out. They pushed the first door and then the second to get the single reward at the end.

Next the researchers put bees in pairs. Trained bees were paired with ones that had never seen the puzzle box. Over and over, the scientists allowed the pairs to explore the box together. The new bees saw the demonstrators solve it. Finally, the untrained bees got to try the puzzle alone. About one-third of them succeeded. They’d learned to solve the challenging puzzle just by watching.