Cognitive Testing

Have you seen us out and about in Sydney, presenting cockatoos with touchscreens? This is the work of Lara Blumenstiel, a masters student at the University of Zurich & visitor at the Australian National University. 

Touchscreen 'computer games' are a common method in lab studies to test a range cognitive abilities in animals, from the ability to learn new associations to abstract reasoning. Lara is to taking the 'lab to the wild', and asking whether wild cockatoos can learn to play a touchscreen game. As with all our work, participating is completely voluntary, the cockies choose to come to us and take a few minutes out of their busy day to play the game!

Lara's experiment, completed in winter 2025, consisted of 3 Stages. In Stage 1, the birds were trained to touch a shape on the screen to receive an almond. In Stage 2, the birds applied their new knowledge to learn which of two shapes on the screen is rewarding, a test of associative learning. In Stage 3, she reversed which shape is rewarding, testing their cognitive flexibility. She is now busy analysing data...