DOLPHIN MEMORY AND INTELLIGENCE

New research reveals that dolphins can recognize the whistles of old "tank mates" after a separation of 20 years.This is the longest social memory recorded for any species other than humans.

The remarkable memory  is another indication that dolphins have a level of cognitive ability comparable to only a few other species, including humans, chimpanzees and elephants. Dolphins' talent for social recognition may be even more long-lasting than facial recognition among humans. This is because human faces change over time but the signature whistle that identifies a dolphin remains stable over many decades.

"This shows us an animal operating cognitively at a level that's very consistent with human social memory," said Jason Bruck, who conducted the study and received his Ph.D. in June 2013 from the University of Chicago's program in Comparative Human Development. His study is published in the current issue of the Proceedings of the Royal Society of London B.

To establish how well dolphins could remember their former companions, Bruck collected data from 53 different bottlenose dolphins at six facilities, including Brookfield Zoo near Chicago and Dolphin Quest in Bermuda. The six sites were part of a breeding consortium that has rotated dolphins and kept records on which ones lived together, going back decades.

"This is the kind of study you can only do with captive groups when you know how long the animals have been apart," Bruck said. "To do a similar study in the wild would be almost impossible."

"Signature whistles" offer means to test memory

Other studies have established that each dolphin develops its own unique signature whistle that appears to function as a name. Researchers Vincent M. Janik and Stephanie L. King at Scotland's University of St. Andrews reported earlier this year that a wild bottlenose dolphin can learn and repeat signatures belonging to other individuals, and answer when another dolphin mimics its unique call.

Bruck played recordings of signature whistles to dolphins that had once lived with the animals that made the calls. Determining whether the dolphins recognized their old companions required a comparison of how they responded to familiar calls versus calls belonging to dolphins they had never met.

Bruck would play recording after recording of signature whistles that the target dolphins had never heard before. His initial studies showed that these "dolphins get bored quickly listening to signature whistles from dolphins they don't know." Once they were habituated to the unfamiliar calls, Bruck would play a recording of an animal that he knew the target dolphin had lived with.

The familiar calls often would perk up the dolphins and elicit an immediate response.

"When they hear a dolphin they know, they often quickly approach the speaker playing the recording," Bruck said. "At times they will hover around, whistle at it, try to get it to whistle back."

To check that the response was the result of recognition, Bruck also would play a test recording of an unfamiliar bottlenose that was the same age and sex as the familiar animal. All the behavior was scored according to how quickly and to what degree the animals responded.

A clear pattern emerged in the data: Compared with unfamiliar calls, dolphins responded significantly more to whistles from animals they once knew, even if they had not heard the calls in decades.

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DOLPHINS IN CAPTIVITY; DO THEY THINK?

When we say "think" we are talking about cognitive ability. And like just about everything else in the world, we tend to measure cognitive ability in our own terms.

In terms of brain size, dolphin brains are significantly larger than our own. If we relate brain size to body mass then we slip into the lead and dolphins come in second. The question is what do dolphins do with all that neural material?

Neuro scientist, Dr Lori Marino, says that some dolphin brains exhibit features correlated with complex intelligence. They have a large expanse of neo-cortical volume that is more convoluted than our own, extensive insular and cingulated regions, and highly differentiated cellular regions.

Dr. Marino went on to say, "Dolphins are sophisticated, self-aware, highly intelligent beings with individual personalities, autonomy and an inner life. They are vulnerable to tremendous suffering and psychological trauma."





While presenting information at the American Association for the Advancement of Science conference (AAAS) in San Diego, she spoke against keeping dolphins in captivity. "Our current knowledge of dolphin brain complexity and intelligence suggests that these practices are potentially psychologically harmful to dolphins and present a misinformed picture of their natural intellectual capacities," Marino says.

Because we are unable to communicate with dolphins, it is difficult to assess their cognitive or thinking ability. Instead scientists use indicators of 'levels' of ability. One indicator is self awareness.





Dr. Marino found that dolphins were able to recognize themselves as distinct from other dolphins in a mirror. This ability is found in higher primates like ourselves and in elephants.

Can dolphins think?

The answer is a definite yes. We don't know what they think about but can guess that their thought processes are complex and relatively sophisticated.

If they think about their social group, hunting, and navigation then they might not spend a lot of time thinking about confinement versus a life in the ocean.

If they have sophisticated thoughts and can compare an aquarium with the ocean then they could be quite miserable in captivity.

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