A Food for All Seasons: Stability of Food Preferences in Gorillas across Testing Methods and Seasons.

Decisions about which foods to use during training and enrichment for captive animals may be based on invalid assumptions about individuals' preferences. It is important to assess the stability of food preferences given that one-time preferences are often used to inform which items are offered over a longer period of time. Presenting preference assessments using images of food items allows control over factors such as size, scent, and inadvertent cueing but requires validation.

Bearing fruit: Piloting a novel judgment bias task in an American black bear.

Judgment bias tasks can reveal changes in affect in animals as a function of environmental manipulations such as provision of enrichment. We assessed affect in an American black bear across seasonal changes in availability of a mulberry bush. We used a novel judgment bias task in which the background color of a touchscreen signaled whether the left or right positioned stimulus was correct.

Cognitive bias in rats is not influenced by oxytocin.

The effect of oxytocin on cognitive bias was investigated in rats in a modified conditioned place preference paradigm. Fifteen male rats were trained to discriminate between two different cue combinations, one paired with palatable foods (reward training), and the other paired with unpalatable food (aversive training). Next, their reactions to two ambiguous cue combinations were evaluated and their latency to contact the goal pot recorded.