Can bees learn from each other?
Short answerTrueEmerging research
Yes. Bumblebees that watch another bee pull a string or open a puzzle box learn to do it far faster than bees working alone, and the behaviour then spreads through a colony and persists as individuals are replaced. Most of this work is on bumblebees rather than honey bees, and that distinction is regularly lost in the reporting.
What has been shown
- String pulling: a bee that observes a demonstrator retrieving a reward by pulling a string acquires the behaviour, and it spreads through a group.
- Ball rolling: bumblebees learn to move a ball to a target for sugar, and improve on the demonstrated technique rather than copying it exactly.
- Puzzle boxes: a solution seeded into a colony spreads, and colonies retain the particular variant they were shown even when an alternative works equally well.
What kind of learning it is
The researchers who did much of this work title it social learning by associative mechanisms, and the phrasing matters. A bee watching another bee does not need to understand the demonstrator's goal: seeing an object move in the presence of a reward is enough to build the association. That is a simpler mechanism than imitation and it produces the same spread.
Sources
- Associative mechanisms allow for social learning and cultural transmission of string pulling in an insect — PLOS Biology (2016) · Peer-reviewed article
- Bumblebees show cognitive flexibility by improving on an observed complex behavior — Science (2017) · Peer-reviewed article
- Bumblebees acquire alternative puzzle-box solutions via social learning — PLOS Biology (2023) · Peer-reviewed article
How sources are selected and weighted is set out in the sources and evidence policy.