Comparing the minds of birds, bees, elephants and us
Humans are not that special
You can learn a good deal about the basis (mechanisms) responsible for all sorts of our brain functions by comparing our brains to that of other living things that can do the kinds of things we are so proud of like…..making and using tools, emotions like empathy, social interactions. Let us take a look at what some recent findings that compare us to our supposed ‘inferior’ other living things.
A steady parade of findings illustrate what we should have known well for some time, namely non human animals are capable of many facets of our behavior that we have traditionally attributed to us and to us alone. This posting will continue to be refreshed with new science findings that illustrate that very point.
It does leave us with many questions. What are the brain systems that are the foundations for behaviors such as tool use, empathy in humans and how are they different or similar to the brain systems that are responsible for how animals behave in human like ways?
A little empathy for our animal cousins
Empathize with the elephants and while you are at it don’t dismiss rats
Don’t really want to get into a debate about whether we should use steer, goats, sheep, turkeys, pigs as food sources. We know that none of these animals are vegetables. We also know that they are quite unlike people in terms of thoughts, emotions, and outlook on life but how different are they?
No one doubts that animals like pigs (and for purposes here) elephants are intelligent but we humans have so much more mind stuff in the cupboard. Maybe.
Here is a list of what animals are capable of that at one time we thought was totally our domain.
- Animals can make and use tools
- They can plan for the future
- They are quite capable of becoming addicted to substances like alcohol, not in the laboratory, but out in the ‘wild’
- The social behavior of many animals is complex, sophisticated and not just simple reflexes.
- They can function as caretakers of animals that are disabled.
- They also seem to be capable of ‘empathy’ providing comfort when their herd mates, their ‘friends’, are stressed out.
- That also means that animals such as Asian elephants, “like great apes, dogs, certain corvids (the bird group that includes ravens), can recognize when a herd mate is upset and to offer gentle caresses and chirps of sympathy” (see National Geographic article by Holland, Feb 18, 2014).
Joshua Plotnik, a behavioral ecologist, studied elephants under naturally occurring stressful conditions such as a dog walking by or a snake rustling in the grass. Elephants, when stressed exhibit behaviors such as erect tails, flared ears; trumpeting sounds, rumbling, or roaring; defecation and urination. When an elephant was distressed it also distressed fellow elephants. Elephants would also move towards upset elephants and would provide caresses, mostly inside the mouth (which is kind of like a hug to elephants) and on the genitals. The bystander elephants also rumbled and chirped which were reassurance vocalizations and would also form a protective circle around a stressed elephant.
Plotnik also noted, “Whenever an elephant showed signs of distress, a reassuring friend was sure to come console them. The number of times when elephants showed distress without a response from others was very rare.” In addition he concluded “I find this very exciting, because it suggests that the buck does NOT stop with us humans when it comes to smarts!” (Read “Inside Animal Minds” in National Geographic magazine.)
Even rats can demonstrate the types of emotions in response to their own actions that we ordinarily think is exclusively human. In a study by Steiner & Redish entitled Behavioral and neurophysiological correlates of regret in rat decision-making on a neuroeconomic task (wow, what a provocative title; in Nature Neuroscience 08 June 2014) the researchers proved that rats can demonstrate regret and disappointment when looking at their own performance (decisions, choices) in working for food rewards. The rats couod ‘appreciate’ that had they tolerated a delay before being rewarded for their performance then their reward would have been more substantial. In humans the orbitofrontal cortex is active during expressions of regret, and when this structure is damaged then expressions of regret are not possible. In rats and nonhuman primates, both the orbitofrontal cortex and the ventral striatum are important neural foundations for the experience of reward. The study conclusions were based on relating neural ensembles from orbitofrontal cortex and ventral striatum ‘in rats encountering wait or skip choices for delayed delivery of different flavors using an economic framework.’
What about language
Dogs and elephants (and loads of other animals appreciate language)
Those of you who have pets like dogs or elephants are not surprised to learn that these mammals and lots of others have brain circuits that can make sense of human language. In a study conducted in dogs that were trained to lie still in a brain scanner it was possible to identify brain areas that they use to understand human language. Those same regions are also the foundations for the ability of dogs to respond appropriately to emotional cues (but you already knew that dogs could do that). For more details see an article by Attila Andics and colleagues in the March 2014 issue of Current Biology.
Elephants can discriminate between human languages and the gender of the speaker.
The findings are reported by McComb and colleagues in a March issue of the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences. The researcher studied elephants in Amboseli National Park in Kenya. The scientists used voice recordings of Maasai men and women as test stimuli. The investigators found that elephants can make fine-level discrimination using human language skills and they are able to acquire quite detailed knowledge which is possible because they have an exceptionally large brain.
“They repeated the experiment with recordings of Maasai men and women. Since women almost never spear elephants, the animals reacted less to the women’s voices. The same thing happened when they substituted young boys’ voices.”
To be human does not mean that we are the only mammals that can appreciate language.
What about the role of oxytocin in social behavior
Oxytocin promotes social bonding in dogs
In an article published by Teresa Romero and colleagues in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Science (9 June 2014) we learn a great deal about the neurobiological foundations of social bonding between dogs and dogs and dogs and man. Presumably the findings are also relevant to explain some of the biology of bonding between people. It turns out that
Oxytocin (OT), a neuropeptide synthesized by the hypothalamus in mammals, regulates many complex forms of social behavior and cognition in both human and nonhuman animals. “Specifically, when sprayed with OT, dogs showed higher social orientation and affiliation toward their owners and higher affiliation and approach behaviors toward dog partners than when sprayed with placebo. Additionally, the exchange of socio-positive behaviors with dog partners triggered the release of endogenous OT, highlighting the involvement of OT in the development of social relationships in the domestic dog. These data provide new insight into the mechanisms that facilitate the maintenance of close social bonds beyond immediate reproductive interest or genetic ties and complement a growing body of evidence that identifies OT as one of the neurochemical foundations of sociality in mammalian species.”
In an earlier article in Proceedings of the National Academy of Science (31 March 2014; authors include S. Shalvi ) we also learn that Oxytocin Boosts Dishonesty, that the
so-called “love hormone” can make people more dishonest
While the hormone oxytocin is usually associated with traits like trust, cooperation, and empathy, but scientists have now found that it can make people more dishonest when their lies serve the interests of their group.
oxytocin has a dark side. Depending on the context, it can hinder trust, reduce cooperation, or trigger negative feelings like envy and schadenfreude. In 2011, de Dreu found that the hormone could make people biased toward others from their own ethnic or cultural group.
“His latest study, conducted by Shaul Shalvi from Ben-Gurion University of the Negev in Israel, adds to this subtler portrait of the hormone’s role. The duo ran a double-blind study in which 60 volunteers played a simple game, after inhaling either oxytocin or a placebo.
Working in teams of three, the recruits were asked to predict the toss of a virtual €1 coin and, once they saw the outcome, to say whether they had guessed correctly. A correct answer could gain them money, lose them money, or do nothing, and any winnings or losses would be divided evenly between the three anonymous teammates.
Shalvi and de Dreu found that when the volunteers stood to gain money, they cheated. On average, those who sniffed the placebo said that they had guessed correctly 67 percent of the time—more than expected by chance. Those who sniffed oxytocin were even more dishonest; they reported correct guesses 80 percent of the time, and were quicker to lie.
The duo found different results when they repeated their experiments, this time telling volunteers that their decisions would affect their own earnings, but not those of their teammates. This time, oxytocin had no effect on their lying.
These results showed that oxytocin could boost dishonest behavior, but only when it served the group and not the individual. “It can actually make people more immoral in the group situation because they’re deceiving, and stealing money from, the experimenter,” said de Dreu.
Even then, he and Shalvi found that the hormone’s effects varied depending on the situation. It had no apparent influence on the volunteers’ behavior when nothing was at stake, or when they stood to lose money. In the latter case, the oxytocin-sniffers under-reported their correct guesses just as often as did the volunteers that inhaled the placebo. De Dreu suggested that humans show such a strong aversion to loss that oxytocin has very little bearing on behavior in this context.
These results fit with the idea that oxytocin is a general social chemical that can wield opposing influences on human behavior in different contexts. “Some people may say that it’s still the ‘love hormone,’ because they love their in-group, but these people are in a very minimalistic setting and they don’t know the others in their group,” said de Dreu. “Oxytocin is causing a more general shift from self-interest to group-interest. It’s simplistic and wrong to call oxytocin a ‘moral’ molecule.”