Many animals live in groups yet grouping tendencies and preferences for groups of different sizes vary considerably between individuals. This variation reflects, at least in part, differences in how individuals evaluate and perceive their physical surroundings and their social environment. While such differences are likely related to individual variation in cognition, there have been few studies that have directly investigated how cognitive abilities are linked to individual grouping decisions. Therefore, in this study we assessed whether performance on a foraging-based reversal learning task is related to grouping preferences (a group of three fish versus a single fish) in a group-living cichlid fish, Neolamprologus pulcher. While most fish preferred to associate with the group over a single fish, individuals that completed the reversal learning task the quickest were the least interested in the group under elevated predation risk. In addition, fish that quickly completed the reversal learning task also adjusted their grouping preferences the most when predation risk increased. This result suggests that the observed relationship between learning performance and grouping decisions may be linked to individual differences in behavioural flexibility. Overall, our results offer valuable insight into the potential factors that underlie inter-individual variation in grouping decisions.

许多动物生活在群体中，但个体之间对不同规模群体的分组倾向和偏好差异很大。这种差异至少部分反映了个人如何评估和感知其物理环境和社会环境的差异。虽然这种差异可能与认知的个体差异有关，但很少有研究直接调查认知能力如何与个体分组决策相关联。因此，在这项研究中，我们评估了基于觅食的反向学习任务的表现是否与群体生活慈鲷鱼Neolamprologus pulcher 的分组偏好（一组三条鱼对比一条鱼）有关. 虽然大多数鱼比一条鱼更喜欢与群体联系，但完成逆转学习任务最快的个体对捕食风险升高的群体最不感兴趣。此外，快速完成逆向学习任务的鱼在捕食风险增加时也会最大程度地调整其分组偏好。这一结果表明，观察到的学习表现和分组决策之间的关系可能与行为灵活性的个体差异有关。总的来说，我们的结果提供了对潜在因素的宝贵见解，这些潜在因素是分组决策中个体间差异的基础。