> If there's any 'memory effect' going on surely it has to be genetic, rather than via any kind of learning or experience?

Hi all
Social insects most definitely learn, and at a very early age. This individual learning contributes to the emergent intelligence of the colony. The colony has a collective memory which influences the new members and the behavior of the colony overall. These are not speculations but have been observed in real colonies of insects, as well as other organisms. I realize some folks may not have been exposed to these ideas, this sort of thinking is relatively new, though the term "superorganism" was coined more than 100 years ago.

¶

The application to colonies of concepts and methods from psychology attempts to make the
superorganism concept more than a suggestive analogy. In this section, we argue for further
application of the approaches reviewed above. Collective cognition has often been assessed using
rudimentary tasks; hence the full abilities of colonies may have been overlooked. Methods from
psychology can make more probing tests of cognitive ability, such as rational choice, avoidance of
cognitive overload, and collective learning. One lesson of this work is that the details of collective
mechanisms matter in determining how the group functions. It cannot be assumed, for example,
that the combination of multiple individuals always produces group improvement or collective
intelligence. As shown with perceptual discrimination by ant colonies, the outcome depends both
on how the colony integrates the inputs of its members and exactly what problem is being solved.

Sasaki, Takao, and Stephen C. Pratt. (2018). "The Psychology of Superorganisms: Collective Decision-Making by Insect Societies." Annu. Rev. Entomol. 2018. 63:259–75

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