This is a multidisciplinary approach, and my research combines concepts and tools from animal behavior, ecology, cognitive psychology and neurobiology. Sex differences in spatial navigation and the hippocampus. Sex differences in ranging behavior predict sex differences in hippocampal size. We are currently investigating the mechanism underlying this remarkable plasticity in the adult hippocampus and its cognitive consequences in voles and tree squirrels, both in the lab and in free-ranging animals. Species which store food in scattered food caches, such as tree squirrels and kangaroo rats, have larger hippocampi than species that do not scatter caches.
Scatter hoarding appears to represent a specialization in memory capacity for spatial locations.
We are currently studying species differences in kangaroo rats and tree squirrels to determine what cues are used to remember places and how this affects accurate recall. Lavenex, P., M.W. Shiflett, R.K. Lee and L.F. Jacobs . Jacobs, L.F . Sexual differentiation and cognitive function. Jacobs, L.F. 1996 .