a `` The book:

Comparative Approach Naturalistic observation: Some animal behavior parallels human behavior (but is it the same?) Field and laboratory experimental tests: define the extent of similarities and differences in behavioral and cognitive abilities. Converging operations – Different lines of evidence are considered (e.g., brain and behavior in different species)

Spatial memory in humans

Follow-up study comparing taxi drivers with controls The size of the right posterior hippocampus was larger in taxi drivers The volume of gray matter in the right posterior hippocampus was positively correlated with the amount of time spent learning to be and practicing as a licensed London taxi driver

Spatial memory in animals The Clark’s nutcracker caches thousands of pine nuts over hundreds of square miles and can retrieve 90% of the stored nuts despite seasonal changes in the landscape (local cues). Rats can generate novel paths in a maze in a single trial to obtain food when a well-learned path is blocked.

Other abilities in animals Insight learning in Kohler’s chimps (or cumulative effect of trial and error learning) Ravens can solve a novel task never before seen (pulling strings to get food) Tool use in chimps and crows Imitation learning in orangutans and dolphins

Other abilities in animals Pigeons understand concepts (trees versus a plant or Picasso versus Monet) Comparison to college students… Pigeons do not understand ‘equal to’ or ‘greater than’ Students do not get small versus large area of color (we search for greater meaning).

Other abilities in animals Counting – Alex (grey parrot) does it perceptually not by counting but Sheba the chimp can do it with abstract thought. Language - Chickens and Meerkats have distinct calls but is it language? Dolphins know 60 signs and can understand “semantically reversible chains” (right water, left basket, fetch vs left water, right basket, fetch); they know that word order affects meaning.

Similarities and differences McPhail: some animals are clever but trial and error learning is the basis of all animal learning, which is different from humans. Goodall: Large-brained animals that live in complex social groups have similar intellectual abilities to humans.