Complex multi-modal sensory integration and context specificity in colour preferences of a pierid butterfly

Abstract

Innate colour preferences in insects were long considered to be a non-flexible representation of a floral ‘search image’ guiding them to flowers during initial foraging trips. However, these colour preferences have recently been shown to be modulated by multi-sensory integration of information. Using experiments on the butterfly Catopsilia pomona (common emigrant), we demonstrate that cross-modal integration of information not only affects colour preferences but also colour learning, and in a sex-specific manner. We show that spontaneous colour preference in this species is sexually dimorphic, with males preferring both blue and yellow while females prefer yellow. With minimal training (two training sessions), both males and females learned to associate blue with reward, but females did not learn green. This suggests that the aversion to green, in the context of foraging, is stronger in females than in males, probably because green is used as a cue to find oviposition sites in butterflies. However, females learned green after extensive training (five training sessions). Intriguingly, when a floral odour was present along with green during training, female colour preference during the subsequent choice tests resembled their innate preference (preference for yellow). Our results show that multi-sensory integration of information can influence preference, sensory bias, learning and memory in butterflies, thus modulating their behaviour in a context-specific manner.