Cuttlefish, marine invertebrates related to squids and octopuses, can pass the so-called “marshmallow test,” an experiment designed to test whether human children have the self-control to wait for a better reward.
The study, published Wednesday in Proceedings of the Royal Society B, places squids in the ranks of larger-brained vertebrates such as great apes, parrots and corvids in terms of how long they can delay gratification and makes them the first invertebrates to show self-control. exhibit. , Live Science reported.
“Self-control is considered the cornerstone of intelligence as it is an important prerequisite for complex decision-making and planning for the future,” lead author and psychology researcher Alex Schnell of the University of Cambridge told Live Science.
The marshmallow experiment was first conducted at Stanford by Walter Mischel in the 1960s. To test the mechanisms behind self-control, children were given the choice between now having one marshmallow or another treat or waiting 15 to 20 minutes to get two. Recent research has cast doubt on the notion that children’s ability to wait determines success later in life, as The Atlantic explained. Instead, both that ability and subsequent performance can be explained by external factors such as economic stability. Still, that hasn’t stopped the test from becoming a viral meme among quarantine-weary parents, as Buzzfeed explained.
For squid, the pay had to be slightly adjusted. Rather than sugary candies, the squid had a choice of a preferred meal like grass shrimp or king shrimp or a less preferred meal like Asian coastal crab, Live Science explained. They got two drawers. One that opened immediately with the less preferred meal and one that opened with a delay with the preferred meal. If they chose the first option, the second snack would disappear.
“Cuttlefish in the current study were all able to wait for the better reward and tolerate delays of up to 50-130 seconds, which is similar to what we see in large brain vertebrates such as chimpanzees, crows and parrots,” said Schnell. the Marine Biological Laboratory (MBL), where the research was conducted.
The researchers then also tested the squid for intelligence and found that the squids that could wait longer for their favorite foods also fared better on a learning test. This is the first time that intelligence and self-control have been linked in any animal other than humans or chimpanzees.
However, Schnell and her colleagues don’t know why squid need self-control. For social animals such as parrots, crows, monkeys and humans, it is important for group solidarity. For example, people wait to eat to share the meals. It can also be important for tool building animals, who must have patience to make a tool before hunting.
In squid, the researchers hypothesize, self-control has a different function.
“Cuttlefish spend most of their time camouflaging, sitting and waiting, punctuated by brief periods of foraging,” Schnell told MBL. “They break camouflage when foraging, so they are exposed to any predator in the ocean that wants to eat them. We speculate that delayed gratification may have arisen as a byproduct of this, so the squid can optimize foraging by waiting to eat them. choose better quality food. “
The fact that both camouflage squid and social monkeys need self-control is an example of something called convergent evolution, a process in which animals develop the same traits through different mechanisms.
Correction: An earlier version of this story said the study was published Thursday. It has been updated to say it was published Wednesday March 3rd.
From your site articles
Related articles on the internet