Nature & Environment
Crows Can Use Rational Thinking Like Humans, Apes and Monkeys (VIDEO)
Catherine Griffin
First Posted: Dec 19, 2014 10:30 AM EST
Crows are smarter than your average bird-brain, but did you know that they may be on the same level as monkeys and apes? Scientists have found that crows have the brain power to solve higher-order, relational-matching tasks, which means that they join humans, apes and monkeys in exhibiting advanced relational thinking.
Crows have long been known for their high intelligence. These birds can remember faces, use tools and even communicate in sophisticated ways. In order to see exactly how smart these corvids are, though, the researchers tested two hooded crows that were at least two years old.
The two crows were first trained and then tested to identify items by color, shape and number of single samples. During training, the birds were placed into a cage into which a plastic tray containing three small cups was occasionally inserted. The sample cup in the middle was covered with a small card on which was pictured a color, shape or number of items. The other two cups were also covered with cards-one that matched the sample and one that did not. The cup with the matching card contained two meal worms, but the crows received no food when they chose the other card.
Once the crows were trained, the researchers tested them with relational matching pairs of items. The crows had to choose two same-sized circles rather than two different sized circles when the sample card displayed two same-sized squares. Surprisingly, the crows correctly performed the matches without explicit training.
"Analogical reasoning, matching relations to relations, has been considered to be among the more so-called 'higher order' abstract reasoning processes," said Anthony Wright, one of the researchers, in a news release. "For decades such reasoning has been thought to be limited to humans and some great apes. The apparent spontaneity of this finding makes it all the more remarkable."
The findings are published in the journal Current Biology.
Want ot see the crow for yourself? Check out the video below, courtesy of YouTube.
For more great science stories and general news, please visit our sister site, Headlines and Global News (HNGN).
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First Posted: Dec 19, 2014 10:30 AM EST
Crows are smarter than your average bird-brain, but did you know that they may be on the same level as monkeys and apes? Scientists have found that crows have the brain power to solve higher-order, relational-matching tasks, which means that they join humans, apes and monkeys in exhibiting advanced relational thinking.
Crows have long been known for their high intelligence. These birds can remember faces, use tools and even communicate in sophisticated ways. In order to see exactly how smart these corvids are, though, the researchers tested two hooded crows that were at least two years old.
The two crows were first trained and then tested to identify items by color, shape and number of single samples. During training, the birds were placed into a cage into which a plastic tray containing three small cups was occasionally inserted. The sample cup in the middle was covered with a small card on which was pictured a color, shape or number of items. The other two cups were also covered with cards-one that matched the sample and one that did not. The cup with the matching card contained two meal worms, but the crows received no food when they chose the other card.
Once the crows were trained, the researchers tested them with relational matching pairs of items. The crows had to choose two same-sized circles rather than two different sized circles when the sample card displayed two same-sized squares. Surprisingly, the crows correctly performed the matches without explicit training.
"Analogical reasoning, matching relations to relations, has been considered to be among the more so-called 'higher order' abstract reasoning processes," said Anthony Wright, one of the researchers, in a news release. "For decades such reasoning has been thought to be limited to humans and some great apes. The apparent spontaneity of this finding makes it all the more remarkable."
The findings are published in the journal Current Biology.
Want ot see the crow for yourself? Check out the video below, courtesy of YouTube.
For more great science stories and general news, please visit our sister site, Headlines and Global News (HNGN).
See Now: NASA's Juno Spacecraft's Rendezvous With Jupiter's Mammoth Cyclone