Successive Discrimination Reversal (SDR) Performances of American Alligators and American Crocodiles on a Spatial Task

Abstract

There is general agreement that birds and mammals, but not fish, can display error reduction on successive discrimination reversal (SDR) tasks. Reptiles, however, show error reduction on some but not other tasks. To provide further sampling of reptilian SDR performance, two species of crocodilians, the American alligator and the American crocodile, were tested on a spatial discrimination reversal task. Both species displayed error reduction, the alligator being appreciably inferior to the crocodile.