Dogs with anxiety have stronger neural connections between the amygdala and other areas of the anxiety network in the brain compared to less anxious dogs.
A bee's "waggle dance", an intricate series of motions that signals the location of critical resources to other bees, is improved by social learning and can be culturally transmitted.
Bumblebees are able to learn to solve puzzles by watching more experienced bees complete a task. This new behavioral preference then spreads throughout the entire colony. The bees that learned from others became more adept and began to prefer the learned solution over alternatives.
While pet dogs and pet pigs pay their owners a similar amount of attention, when it comes to pointing to the location of an out-of-range treat, only dogs direct their owner's attention to the location. Findings suggest directing human attention to an interesting location is not ubiquitous in domesticated animals.
Toddlers are twice as likely to help a dog reach a toy, even when the animal showed no interest in the object. The findings suggest toddlers' prosocial and goal-reading abilities extend beyond other humans and to animals.
People who score higher for empathy traits are better able to understand and decode the emotional sounds of animals.
Areas of the genome associated with brain development harbor variants that seem to account for behavioral differences between dog breeds. The genomic differences between dog breeds are related to the development of their nervous systems. Researchers say genes associated with different dog lineages may relate to genes involved in the development of human behavior.
Social bees venture further for pollen and nectar than their less social counterparts.
Cats alter their behavior when their owner speaks in a cat-directed tone toward them, but not when their owner talks to another human or when a stranger addresses them in a cat-directed tone. Evidence suggests cats are able to, and do form strong bonds with their owners.
Male vampire bats infected with rabies socially withdraw, scaling back their social behavior of grooming other bats before they succumb to the disease.
Wolves, like dogs, prefer the presence of a familiar person over that of a stranger. Familiarity with a human has a positive and calming impact on a wolf's social behavior.
A new study reports that dog-assisted interventions lower cortisol levels and overall stress in young children.
