Naturalizing Anthropomorphism: Behavioral Prompts to Our Humanizing of Animals

Anthropomorphism is the use of human characteristics to describe or explain nonhuman animals. In the present paper, we propose a model for a unified study of such anthropomorphizing. We bring together previously disparate accounts of why and how we anthropomorphize and suggest a means to analyze anthropomorphizing behavior itself. We introduce an analysis of bouts of dyadic play between humans and a heavily anthropomorphized animal, the domestic dog. Four distinct patterns of social interaction recur in successful dog–human play: directed responses by one player to the other, indications of intent, mutual behaviors, and contingent activity. These findings serve as a preliminary answer to the question, “What behaviors prompt anthropomorphisms?” An analysis of anthropomorphizing is potentially useful in establishing a scientific basis for this behavior, in explaining its endurance, in the design of “lifelike” robots, and in the analysis of human interaction. Finally, the relevance of this developing scientific area to contemporary debates about anthropomorphizing behavior is discussed

Fish are smart and feel pain: What about joy?

Sneddon et al. rightly point out that the evidence of fish pain is now so strong and comprehensive that arguments against it have become increasingly difficult to defend in balanced academic discourse. But sentience involves more than just pain. Recent research indicates that fish have an impressive range of cognitive capacities, including the capacity for pleasure, in the form of play and other behaviors likely to involve positively valenced experience. Having made the case for pain, research can now focus on other aspects of fish sentience. Doing so will not only provide a more complete picture of the mental lives and abilities of fish, but it will also promote their welfare and protection

Fish are smart and feel pain: What about joy?

Sneddon et al. rightly point out that the evidence of fish pain is now so strong and comprehensive that arguments against it have become increasingly difficult to defend in balanced academic discourse. But sentience involves more than just pain. Recent research indicates that fish have an impressive range of cognitive capacities, including the capacity for pleasure, in the form of play and other behaviors likely to involve positively valenced experience. Having made the case for pain, research can now focus on other aspects of fish sentience. Doing so will not only provide a more complete picture of the mental lives and abilities of fish, but it will also promote their welfare and protection

Fill-in-the-blank-emotion in dogs? Evidence from brain imaging

What is needed to make meaningful claims about an animal’s capacity for subjective experience? Cook et al. (2018) attempt to study jealousy in dogs by placing them in a particular context and then seeing whether they display a particular brain state. We argue that this approach to studying jealousy falls short for two related reasons. First, the relationship between jealousy and the selected context is unclear. Second, the relationship between jealousy and the selected brain state (indeed, any single brain state) is unclear. These and other issues seriously limit what this study can show. It is important not to see this study as showing more than it does

Centering Individual Animals to Improve Research and Citation Practices

Modern behavioural scientists have come to acknowledge that individual animals may respond differently to the same stimuli and that the quality of welfare and lived experience can affect behavioural responses. However, much of the foundational research in behavioural science lacked awareness of the effect of both welfare and individuality on data, bringing their results into question. This oversight is rarely addressed when citing seminal works as their findings are considered crucial to our understanding of animal behaviour. Furthermore, more recent research may reflect this lack of awareness by replication of earlier methods – exacerbating the problem. The purpose of this review is threefold. First, we critique seminal papers in animal behaviour as a model for re-examining past experiments, attending to gaps in knowledge or concern about how welfare may have affected results. Second, we propose a means to cite past and future research in a way that is transparent and conscious of the abovementioned problems. Third, we propose a method of transparent reporting for future behaviour research that (i) improves replicability, (ii) accounts for individuality of non-human participants, and (iii) considers the impact of the animals\u27 welfare on the validity of the science. With this combined approach, we aim both to advance the conversation surrounding behaviour scholarship while also serving to drive open engagement in future science

Dogs Produce Distinctive Play Pants: Confirming Simonet

Vocalizations in expressive, nonhuman animals can explain the evolution of human communication. A domain-specific play pant in dogs can signify a comparison to human laughter and can explain the development of interspecies empathy through social contagion. A prescreening survey captured demographic information about the guardian and the dog. Accepted pairs wore wireless microphones, transmitters, and a harness, while a camera captured video. Independent raters analyzed audio and video recordings across training, play and shared rest interactions via an ethogram and RavenLite. There is evidence that dogs produce a play pant. When interacting with their guardians, dogs produced more vocalizations during play than in training or shared rest. A one-way ANOVA resulted in significant differences regarding the presence of vocalizations during the three interactions (F2,39 = 5.897, p = 0.006). While a Tukey post hoc test revealed that fewer play pants were observed during training (0.875 ± 1.30 min, p = 0.018) and shared rest (0.875 ± 1.60 min, p = 0.013) as compared to play interactions (20.63 ± 29.14 min). By validating the canine play pant, our work is among the first to explore the evolution of laughter as a signal between species

Dogs Produce Distinctive Play Pants: Confirming Simonet et al. (2001)

Identifying meaningful vocalizations in nonhuman animals can help explain the evolution of human communications. However, non-speech-like sounds, including laughter equivalents, are not well studied, although they may be meaningful. In this pilot study we investigate whether dogs perform a domain-specific pant during play by capturing vocalizations and behaviors during three interactions: training, play, and rest. Sixteen human and dog dyads participated in a session that included all three interactions in the same order: training, play, rest. During these sessions, each partner wore wireless microphones that transmitted to a receiver and digital recorder, while a standalone digital camera captured video of the interactions. A one-way ANOVA demonstrates that dogs do perform a domain-specific play pant, which was almost completely absent during training and rest. These vocalizations mostly co-occurred with play behaviors (e.g., play bow) or tickling and cuddling. These preliminary findings suggest that a laugh-like play pant is used by dogs during play; future research should explore other interspecific acoustic signals as derived from conspecific signals and having communicative function

"The Block Makes It Go": Causal Language Helps Toddlers Integrate Prediction, Action, and Expectations about Contact Relations

Some researchers have suggested that correlation information and information about action are bound in a single representation: “causal knowledge”. If children have only observed correlation information, do they spontaneously try to generate the effect? Do they represent the relationship as potentially causal? We present three action and looking-time studies that suggest that even when toddlers (mean; 24 months) predict that one event will follow another, they neither initiate the first event to try to generate the second (as preschoolers, mean 47 months, do spontaneously), nor do they expect that the predictive relations will involve physical contact. Toddlers succeed at both of these inferences when the events are described using causal language. This suggests that causal language plays a role in helping children recognize the relationship between prediction, action, and contact causality.American Psychological Foundation (Elizabeth Munsterberg Koppitz Fellowship)McDonnell FoundationMassachusetts Institute of Technology (James H. Ferry Fund grant

Centring individual animals to improve research and citation practices

Modern behavioural scientists have come to acknowledge that individual animals may respond differently to the same stimuli and that the quality of welfare and lived experience can affect behavioural responses. However, much of the foundational research in behavioural science lacked awareness of the effect of both welfare and individuality on data, bringing their results into question. This oversight is rarely addressed when citing seminal works as their findings are considered crucial to our understanding of animal behaviour. Furthermore, more recent research may reflect this lack of awareness by replication of earlier methods – exacerbating the problem. The purpose of this review is threefold. First, we critique seminal papers in animal behaviour as a model for re-examining past experiments, attending to gaps in knowledge or concern about how welfare may have affected results. Second, we propose a means to cite past and future research in a way that is transparent and conscious of the abovementioned problems. Third, we propose a method of transparent reporting for future behaviour research that (i) improves replicability, (ii) accounts for individuality of non-human participants, and (iii) considers the impact of the animals' welfare on the validity of the science. With this combined approach, we aim both to advance the conversation surrounding behaviour scholarship while also serving to drive open engagement in future science

Humanity’s Best Friend: A Dog-Centric Approach to Addressing Global Challenges

No other animal has a closer mutualistic relationship with humans than the dog (Canis familiaris). Domesticated from the Eurasian grey wolf (Canis lupus), dogs have evolved alongside humans over millennia in a relationship that has transformed dogs and the environments in which humans and dogs have co-inhabited. The story of the dog is the story of recent humanity, in all its biological and cultural complexity. By exploring human-dog-environment interactions throughout time and space, it is possible not only to understand vital elements of global history, but also to critically assess our present-day relationship with the natural world, and to begin to mitigate future global challenges. In this paper, co-authored by researchers from across the natural and social sciences, arts and humanities, we argue that a dog-centric approach provides a new model for future academic enquiry and engagement with both the public and the global environmental agenda