Interactive virtual objects attract attention and induce exploratory behaviours in rats

Abstract

Animals use visual information to recognize the value of objects and respond with different behaviours, such as evasion or approach. While rodents show defensive behaviour toward an artificial looming stimulus that mimics an approaching avian predator, the visual feature that attracts them to targets with positive value, such as prey, remains unclear. Here, we reveal that rats show curiosity-related behaviours towards a virtual object on screen when it moves interactively with their movements, whereas they show less response to a static object, a regularly moving object, or interactive dislocation of the background. To mimic evading prey, we programmed the object to shrink when touched. Rats preferentially responded to interactive shrinking over interactive enlargement. These results suggest that rats exhibit a selective response to interactive objects. This would seem to be an efficient strategy for finding optimal prey using the evolutionarily conserved prey-predator relationship.