One of the simplest forms of behavior, operant behavior, appears fundamentally prospective, implying potential similarity to 'sophisticated' prospective behaviors like planning in terms of underlying mechanisms. But differences between paradigms for studying behavior resulting from 'simple' versus 'sophisticated' mechanisms prevent true comparison of underlying mechanisms. To aid development of an operant paradigm with more similarity to 'sophisticated' prospective paradigms, we replicated and extended Cowie and Davison's (2021) investing task. Pigeons were required to emit an investing response to ensure food at a different time and different response location. We asked if investing depended on whether the behavior was a single, discrete key peck (typical in operant paradigms) or an extended sequence of pecks (echoing behaviors in planning paradigms), and whether facilitative effects of an immediate stimulus change persisted when the stimulus change no longer occurred. Pigeons invested successfully whether investing required one or more responses, and for extended investing responses, performance did not worsen significantly with increasing response requirements. Experience investing with an immediate stimulus change did not enhance subsequent investing without the stimulus change. Findings show simple learning mechanisms can support extended activities with no immediate consequences. Further, they support the investing paradigm as a potential tool for investigations of overlap in mechanisms controlling 'simple' and 'sophisticated' behavior.

Sarah Cowie

Michael Davison

Behavioural Processes

BEHAVIORAL PROCESSES 致力于从任何理论角度发表关于动物行为的高质量原创研究。它欢迎从行为分析、认知、行为学、生态和进化的角度考虑动物行为的贡献。这份清单并非详尽无遗，特别欢迎整合跨学科理论和方法论的论文。

Behavioural Processes is dedicated to publishing high-quality original research on animal behavior from any theoretical perspective. Contributions are welcomed from the fields of behavioral analysis, cognition, ethology, ecology, and evolution. We particularly encourage papers that integrate interdisciplinary theories and methodologies.

《Behavioural Processes》致力于发表关于动物行为的高质量原创研究，欢迎从行为分析、认知、行为学、生态和进化等多个理论角度进行贡献。我们特别鼓励整合跨学科的理论和方法论的论文。

Category	Quartile
生物学	4
生物学, 动物学	3
生物学, 行为科学	4
生物学, 心理学生物	4

Cost does not prevent pigeons from investing in the future.

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