The cognitive, emotional, and behavior lives of animals

[RandomWiktor]

So, we started having a really interesting discussion in Amy's topic about if pets know we love them about animal thought, emotion, and behavior. I figure this might be something many of the animal-loving folks on this board find fascinating, so I figured why not start a topic on it?

What are your views on animal intelligence, emotion, and behavior? Do you believe they are strictly instrinct driven? That they have some simplistic emotions and mental processes but nothing remotely on par with humans? Do you feel that they are just like us?

My thoughts, based on many long, nerdy years of reading more peer-reviewed studies on the topic than I care to admit, lies somewhere in the middle. I believe that all animals - including humans - are the product of instinct, learning & othercognitive processes, and emotion. I feel that the science of studying animal behavior and thought is still very limited, primarily by how difficult it is to "get inside the head" of another species and thus create fair and objective methods of testing their abilities. I suspect we are going to find that many species - including those we've written off as little more than biological machines - have much more going on upstairs than we think.

I also feel that mental processes and emotions, like all other traits, are probably more evolved in some species and less evolved in others based on their necessity to that species' survival; I find it laughable that we assume humans are set so far apart in this regard when we see a very deliberate progression of all other biological processes from an evolutionary standpoint.

I think everyone has read about chimps that know sign language, dogs who mourn lost owners, dolphins who play, etc. but I think to really start understanding the cognitive and emotional lives of animals, we do well to look at much "simpler" species where the roots of these remarkable behaviors were laid.Scientists are just starting to tackle this and what they are finding is amazing.
Here's just a few things I've encountered in reading:
- Jumping spiders seem capable of problem solving and planning based on studies involving the presentation of complicated tasks to test subjects that they would not encounter in nature and thus have no "instinctive" response to.
- Nautalis exhibit short and long term memory despite lacking the anatomy thought necessary for it.
- Bees canassess the credibility of a message from conspecifics; in field studies, bees would rarely follow the "directions" (bees communicate specific locations through a very complicated "waggle dance" to hivemates)to a food source in a very unlikely location (ie. the middle of a lake)given by another bee, but would readily follow "directions" to logical locations (ie. a field).
- Fish can not only learn complex tasks from observing other fish, but can evaluate the success of shoalmates and associate with more successful individuals.
- Reptilesexhibit playful behavior, such as locomotor and object manipulation play.
- Rats seem to exhibit empathy; in a test where a rat would receive a food reward that resulted in another (unrelated) rat being violently electrically shocked, they stopped attempting to get a reward.
- Chickens have one of the most complex "linguistic" systems outside of the primate world, with complicated calls specific to certain types of threats, certain types of food, and particular social situations.

Anyways... what do you guys think?

 

[katt]

I am really torn on this topic. On one had I want to believe my pets can think and feel and act just as I do, but on the other I wonder just how evolved (in comparison to humans) they are.

What I do know? That most learn, that they can feel something emotion wise. How often have we seen a bondmate die and the other rabbit morn their loss for days/weeks. . . I know that when Herman died, something changed in Winnie.

And speaking of death, have you ever watched an animal/pet find one of it's own dead. They almost appear devastated. Now this could just be me putting human emotion to an animal (what is that called? can't think of the word). But IMO there is something there.

I know that I have seen in my rabbits alone a wide variety of emotions.

Or take for example (not sure if this is getting way off topic) my old rescue puppy Mia. I took her in from a very bad situation (caged 10 hours a day, completely ignored the other 14, starved, and dehydrated all by 3 months of age). This was YEARS ago that I took her (around 4 or 5) and I only had her for about 4 months while I got her health back and her trust, to this day she knows me, you can tell. I only see her a handful of times a year at best, and each time she sees me (without any encouragement from myself or others) she instantly goes back to old habits she had in my care that she didn't carry with her to her new home.

You mentioned chickens and their language skills. Lets look at this often ignored animal. I will full state that yes, they have a wide range of vocal calls and noises that you can tell (and learn from owning) are meant for different things (basically they aren't just 'making noise'). But also, this is often thought to be one of the 'dumbest' animals alive. But I disagree. When we raised them they knew the different between myself and the rest of the family (I was the little girl that would take naps outside and they would all come and cuddle up for an afternoon nap with me). We had one that even acted like a dog to the extreme of jumping in our laps while we were at the fire pit to take a nap, and fallowing us down the road if we went for a walk. She played 'tag' games with us, and would respond to her name. Tell me this is a 'stupid' animal that can't learn anything?

Or what about something like my simple little beta fish? He knows who I am, Flares for me, and my roommate, but won't for anyone else. Or my last one that would blow bubbles for me when I talked to him, but Jessica (my roommate) never got the chance to see no matter how much she sat by his tank and talked to him.

So yes, I believe that they are instinct driven, like all of us to a certain level, but I also cannot see how they are not emotionally driven as well. I don't think they are just like us, but I think they are similar. I guess in my often wrong, and totally odd mind I kind of see it as Humans are just evolving faster then other animals, and every animals is at a different level of evolving, so right now a dog might not show the same level of intelligence that a person does, but it is there. I guess this really isn't making any sense, I am not very good at explaining this.

 

[hartleybun]

having watched my own animals over the years i believe there is something in this - my dogs in particular.

with the bunnies i can only speak from how roxy was when her bonded mate, hartley died. she was found beside his body in the classic rexy puffball pose. she was still in the same position the following morning, having not eaten or drank. at that point i phoned her breeder who had another buck i could have. the minute roxy was aware of another bunny she perked up completely.

the science of it all is waaay beyond me but i do think they are more than instinct driven. i do wonder if domestication is altering how they think and feel tho?

a very interesting thread

 

[Jessyka]

My boyfriend believes that they are driven purely on instinct, nothing else. I honestly need to research more on the issue, if I can find a good source.

 

[RandomWiktor]

Methinks the boyfriend needs to read some current biology literature I can't say I've ever met a biologist that still holds that belief; it's essentially been written off as unscientific due to the massive ammount of evidence to the contrary. Contemporary science is pretty much in agreement that animals are not strictly instinct-driven; the disagreement is on the degree to which they think, the degree to which they are instinctively governed, and which species have what cognitive abilities.

In animal behavioral science, there's a concept a lot like occum's razor called morgan's canon. Basically, the simplest process capable of producing a behavior is deemed the most likely. Often, the most reasonable explanation is instinct. However, we see animals perform such remarkable tasks in situations so unlike what they would naturally encounter that at some point, the balance tilts the other way, and a cognitive process is a more reasonable explanation than an instinctive one. After all, is it more likely that animals are instinctively coded for every possible novel situation, including those they would never encounter in nature? Or is it more likely that animals are capable of some level of thought as a necessity of surviving novel situations? This is basically the direction the science is going today.

If you ever want to read on the topic, there's a ton of great behavioral psychology, cognitive ethology, etc. journals out there worth reading. However, if you don't have a background in science, a list of graphs and p-values probably doesn't carry too much meaning. I would instead consider checking out books like Inside the Animal Mind, which present a very fair and scientific approach to considering animal intelligence. Books on the subject are proliferating like mad, some very reasonable, others grasping for straws. But you can definitely find ample material on the subject, backed by actual scientific studies, if you search a bit.

If you're a believer in evolution, animal cognition and emotion just plain makes sense. Everything in evolution shows a process of gradual shift from lower to higher levels of complexity, so why would cognition or emotion be any different? Is it truly reasonable to think that animals that are nearly identical to us physiologically have absolutely nothing in common with us mentally? Or would it be more reasonable to think that cognitive processes evolved from the least complex to the most complex over time? This is precisely why cognitive ethology studies behavior in an evolutionary context.

This is a total anectdote and thus invalid from a scientific perspective, but I think here is a decent example of something that would be hard to explain away with instinct. My fiance is a zookeeper by profession and used to work with orangatans, a primate species currently thought to be one of the most intelligent - probably moreso than chimps. One of the orangs he worked with knew sign language. The orang was curious about a fresh scar on his thumb and wanted a closer look at it, so Steve showed it to him. After looking it over and touching it, the orang stood up, parted his fur, and pointed to a nasty scar on his chest. He then signed "It Hurt."

Again, nothing that would stand on its own scientifically, but if you read the numerous studies of orangs use of sign lanugage, problem solving abilities, complex displays of emotion, and presence of cultural differences between troops, it becomes very apparent that more than instinct happens in the minds of these species.

 

[Jessyka]

WOW! Come to my house and teach me more things! Do you mind if I send this to my boyfriend? You put that more eloquently than I could ever hope to. :biggrin:

I love learning about animals, but this is one area that I've always shied away from. I suppose it's about time I confronted it.

 

[RandomWiktor]

It's a REALLY fascinating topic and one that I feel develops a whole new sense of wonder and fascination with the animal world. I definitely suggest seeing if you local library has any reads on the subject. If you can find anything by Konrad Lorenz, it's probably a decent place to start; he's essentially the father of cognitive ethology. Mind of the Raven is another good one by another respected scientist, and I really do think Inside the Animal Mind is a good intro. Even books like Drawing the Line give a lot of neat insights on where species fall on the cognitive scale and what research lead to that rating. Really, if you type "animal behavior" or "animal cognition" into Amazon, you can probably find a ton of reads from the very dry and scientific (ie. Species of Mind, The Genesis of Animal Play, etc.) to the perhaps not scientific enough.

ScienceDaily.com often has neat little summaries of contemporary animal behavior research as well if you do a bit of searching. It's nice because it offers some of the same info as actual research papers, but in a format appropriate for laypersons. I routinely see articles on there about learning in animals in particular - another super fascinating subject in animal cognition. And you'd be shocked at which species; you hear plenty about primates, dolphins, dogs, etc. but the things that fish seem to learn observationally from one another is staggaring. Really interesting stuff!

 

[luvthempigs]

Well, I feel that animals do have emotions and feelings and aremuch smarter thanmost people willgive them credit for :nod

I think it's pretty obvious to all of us who own or have owned pets. It's the people who see animals more like a piece of property and have no disreguard for animal life who think otherwise.

Let's see...I consider my pets to be my children so yes, I feel that they are just like us. No, I take that back. They are much more loving and forgiving than most human beings.

 

[Bassetluv]

I find this to be a very interesting subject, though I don't have the background that many researchers possess (or even the knowledge of many studies that have been undertaken). All I really have to go on is my own personal beliefs, along with the experiences I've had with animals over the years.

One thing I've noticed about a great many humans is that they tend to anthropomorphize their pets, often without knowing it. It seems that as a species, humans have this innate need to be loved and needed, and pets fulfill that need. And because of this need, they will project human feelings onto their pets in a variety of ways; often, for instance, they will believe that the pet loves them as deeply as they love the pet, and will pine away if separated from them. Yet a great many pets would do very well if their owners were to suddenly disappear, provided someone else was to take the owner's place and give them food, shelter and affection. Even the issue of separation anxiety in dogs - an issue that my own dog had when I first adopted her - many dog owners would interpret as "my dog hates it when I leave the house, he cannot stand to have me away from him". However, I believe that in most cases, separation anxiety is a result of a couple of different things: (1) boredom, resulting from not enough exercise/mental stimulus; and (2) anxiety from being separated from his 'pack'. By nature, a dog is a pack animal, living and travelling with others of its own species; being separated from that pack can, in the wild, become a life-or-death situation, and so this separation from the owner(s) (the dog's inherited 'pack'), can trigger anxious behavior. So looking at pets in this light, I do believe that a great many things are misinterpreted by humans, or are imposed upon animals by them.

That said, however...I do also believe that not everything is black and white. Yes, humans do anthropomorphize (almost incessantly, it seems, in North America). But at the same time, do animals have their own thoughts, behaviors, emotions? I absolutely believe so. Do I believe in animal communication (i.e., animal communicators)? In the past, I'd always been hesitant about this one, but honestly, I do now have to say yes, for the most part. And the reason why I had to drop my skepticism about it came when I lost Raph, my first English lop. The day he was scheduled to be euthanized, I sat with him in my backyard on a swingset, gently rocking him back and forth, stroking his fur and *talking* to him silently. I still wasn't certain if the decision I'd made to end his life was what *he* wanted, and so I sat there questioning it, talking to him, wondering. And suddenly - clear as day - I *heard* him answering me. He told me, without words, but more as if he was communicating his feelings, that everything was fine, that he understood what was happening and he agreed that it was what was best for him, simply because it was best for me. I find it hard to describe in words what he meant, but will try: He was telling me that all animals who have devoted, caring owners are always okay with the decisions that those owners make when it comes to choices on the animals' behalf. They know, on a soul level, that the choice the owner makes is what was always meant to be...and that life - physical life - is not measured in time. It is measured in quality, in teachings given from teacher to student, and in love. Raph was definitely my teacher, and I strongly felt he came to me to show me several things. I've had a great many animals in my life, but Raph was the first with whom I ever communicated like that.

Of course who is to say that what I heard from my pet rabbit wasn't all part of my imagination? I certainly cannot convince anyone, nor would I try...and I would not ever say that without a doubt, it truly was animal communication. All I can go by is the impact it had on me when it happened; the intense spiritual feeling it had, the feeling of oneness between this creature and myself. It actually startled me when it happened, and yet at the same time it left me with such a feeling of peace...I think it is what got me through that day. So when I hear of animal communicators, I do still get that skeptical feeling, yet at the same time I cannot deny that I do believe in it, and am certain that there are those who can communicate with animals...just as I believe that such communication does not take place on the physical level; I believe it is the person getting in touch with the animal's soul.

btw, I read a book recently by Jon Katz, "A Good Dog". If you are not familiar with this writer, he is a man who tends to be highly skeptical of those who say they can communicate with animals. Yet toward the end of his book he describes what happened when he had to have his dog, Devon (renamed "Orson" after he'd taken him in) euthanized. Orson had a great many issues to contend with throughout his time with Jon, and in desperation to try and help him, Jon had taken advice from a friend and had called a shaman, even though he did not himself believe in such things. He stated that the woman came to see Orson and got to know him, and related to Jon a great many things about the dog, but he wasn't convinced that she was truly communicating with him. But, one day a month or so after Orson died, the woman called Jon and left a message on his answering machine, asking how Orson was because, as she said, he'd come to her in a dream and had taken her on a journey. She had no idea that Orson had died when she called Jon, but she said on the message that he wanted to tell her that he was "released, and felt happy and free; and that he wanted Jon to know that he (Orson) was still taking care of him, watching over him". Not understanding, she contacted Jon to find out what Orson meant. So when he phoned her back they decided to get together, and she got in contact with Orson's spirit again. She described Orson leading her to a dark wooded area up in the hills behind Jon's farm, but the dark woods gave way to a bright open area that radiated brilliant light. She said that he told her this was where he now dwelled...and Jon immediately realized that she was describing a place where he used to take Orson, and where he would go after Orson had died, to sit and stare at Sirius...the Dog Star. Then she described to Jon that Orson was still with him, remaining with him until he finished writing his book. And when Jon asked her if Orson was around him physically she responded, 'Yes...he rests his head on your right foot when you sit at your computer and write'. This startled him, because he said that for the past few weeks, whenever he was sitting at his computer he could feel pressure on his right foot...so noticeable that he even mentioned it to his wife, who suggested he call his doctor. Yet he only felt it when he sat at the computer, working on his book.

When I read that part of Jon's book I actually felt chills, as it describes how I've felt with my own connection to animals in my life. And this is what fascinates me, truly; the huge connection that we can have with any living creature...and because of it, I have always believed that all animals think independent thoughts, and their actions often go beyond mere instincts. So we can and do *humanize* animals, but I do believe that while animals (including the human animal) will act - and react - instinctively, there is just so much more to all of us beyond just instinct and trying to survive.

And personally, I think the biggest challenge to understanding animals and what 'makes them tick', is Humankind's limited ability to understand what they are trying to tell us.

 

[tamsin]

I imagine in the wild, experiences are often pretty similar to other individuals of the same species that are living in the same environment, so perhaps it's not as clear quite how much they learn until they are put in situations that's aren't natural. A lot of what might seem like instinct is actually learnt behaviour... it's just they all learnt the same thing.

I've watched Scamp (hand reared wild rabbit) pick up his treat ball, jump on a box and drop it on the floor, then repeat that behaviour until it broke open. That's pretty smart

 

[juliew19673]

I could write paragraphs about seeing my pets learn how to do things by watching me; and then passing this new knowledge on to the other animals in the house; or how they problems solve - my newest bun would push her cottage inside her Xpen until it was against the side of the pen and then she could jump out. Ofcourse she only put latter part of the plan into action after I was deeply asleep.

I had a black widow spider I caught and ended up keeping as a pet and that was one of the most fascinating animals; constantly rearranging/tearing down things to make the most effective enviroment; pulling boxes off crickets to get at them (my idea to see if she would be able to figure it out and to give her some entertainment).

If anybody would just spend the time to really watch their pets go about their day-to-day activities you can learn so much.

 

[Bassetluv]

juliew, your story about your black widow spider reminds me of the time I encountered a cockroach in an apartment I'd been living in. It was on the kitchen countertop and was darting back and forth around some dishes, and when I spotted it I grabbed a can of flea spray I'd had in the cabinet to kill it. I tried for about 10-15 minutes to get the bug, but he was hiding at the back of a small plate...and every time he'd stick his head out on one side, I'd go to spray him and he'd scoot back, then emerge on the other side. Nothing too unusual...but as I was going through this game of 'cat and mouse' with him, at one point he poked his head out and stared at me, and I stared back at him. And I was suddenly struck with the most enormous sensation that he was reasoning; that he was sizing me up, calculating what to do, and that his thought process was definitely there.

It bothered me so much that I couldn't kill him. I put the can down and, as soon as I did, he came out of hiding and then darted off to safety. I've felt strong connections with many animals in the past, but this was the first time I felt a connection with an insect.

Oh, one other thing that happened to me several years ago. I had been riding my bike to work one morning when I came across someone's cat playing with something in the middle of the road. It was a side street, and it was very early in the morning, so there was no traffic. As I got closer to the cat I realized it was actually 'playing' with a mouse...letting the mouse run just so far, then going after it, tossing it up in the air with a paw, grabbing it, etc. I felt so badly for the little mouse that I stopped my bike and managed to position myself (still straddling my bike) between the cat and the very frightened mouse. I was using the bike's front wheel to block the (very fat, obviously well-fed) cat. He was a determined feline, however; when I'd move the wheel one way he'd go to the other side, trying to get around it...so I'd move it the other way and block him again. This went on for a minute or two, and in the meantime I was hoping the mouse would see his chance and take off. Unfortunately the little guy must have been disoriented from it all, because he would run in circles, only going a foot or so before speeding back to his original spot.

Then the mouse turned around and faced me. I looked down and saw him as he suddenly darted over and actually jumped up on top of my sneaker, and he looked up at me, our eyes met, and he let out this tiny chirp. I swear to this day, I felt that he was asking me for help. And to this day it haunts me, because as much as I tried to get that cat away, in the end the cat outsmarted me...a moment later he managed to lunge around my bike wheel and grab the little mouse, and then ran off with him. But I must say, the 'connection', or communication that I felt came from that mouse was just overwhelming. No one will ever convince me that animals cannot communicate or reason...