Abstract: Description
How do animals perceive the world, learn, remember, search for food or mates, and find their way around? Do any non-human animals count, imitate one another, use a language, or think as we do? What use is cognition in nature and how might it have evolved? Historically, research on such questions has been fragmented between psychology, where the emphasis has been on theoretical models and lab experiments, and biology, where studies focus on evolution and the adaptive use of perception, learning, and decision-making in the field.
Cognition, Evolution and the Study of Behavior integrates research from psychology, behavioral ecology, and ethology in a wide-ranging synthesis of theory and research about animal cognition in the broadest sense, from species-specific adaptations in fish to cognitive mapping in rats and honeybees to theories of mind for chimpanzees. As a major contribution to the emerging discipline of comparative cognition, the book is an invaluable resource for all students and researchers in psychology, zoology, behavioral neuroscience. It will also interest general readers curious about the details of how and why animals--including humans--process, retain, and use information as they do.
Reviews
“This book is a very comprehensive review of animal cognition. It differs from other texts on this topic in a number of ways, as outlined by Shettleworth in her preface and in the opening chapter. Essentially, Shettleworth wants to advocate an 'adaptationist or ecological approach to cognition'. In doing so, she brings together a wealth of data on animal cognition, studied from quite different theoretical viewpoints, such as cognitive ethology, animal learning theory, neuroscience, behavioural ecology and cognitive psychology. . . . Each chapter ends with a clear and useful summary, and helpful suggestions for further reading. The book's numerous illustrations, which are mostly tables or figures redrawn by Margaret Nelson, greatly add to its appeal. . . . [T]his is a marvellously rich, well-written and stimulating book. . . . I greatly enjoyed reading [and] recommend it highly to anyone interested in animal cognition, evolution and behaviour.”--Animal Behaviour
“Sara Shettleworth has probably written the most comprehensive study of the animal mind ever and therefore a fundamental textbook on 'comparative cognition'. She first gets consciousness out of the way: whether an animal is conscious or not is impossible to determine, since consciousness is a private, subjective phenomenon. We can study cognition, and certainly cognition lends credibility to the idea that at least some animals must be at least to some degree conscious, but experiments can only prove facts about cognition. She reviews the field of cognitive ethology from the beginning and then analyzes the main cognitive tasks from an information-processing perspective By the end of her review of cognitive faculties, it become apparent that, at least among vertebrates, there are no significant differences in learning, except for language. All vertebrates are capable of 'associative' learning What no other vertebrate seems to be capable of is 'syntax'.” -- Piero Scaruffi, Thymos.com

Abstract: In a series of studies, we evaluated the susceptibility of radioimmunoassays (RIA) for saliva cortisol to interference effects caused by oral stimulants used to facilitate saliva collection in studies with children. When added directly to saliva samples, oral stimulants (drink mix crystals) artificially inflated estimated cortisol concentrations. The magnitude of the interference effect was concentration-dependent and more pronounced for some stimulants and RIA procedures than for others. Analysis of samples collected using oral stimulants from child and adult participants confirmed stimulant interference as an extraneous source of variability in measured saliva cortisol. Associations between serum and saliva cortisol and between saliva cortisol and “behavioral” variables were attenuated by stimulant interference. A survey of six large child studies estimated interference effects, indexed by low sample pH, to be present in 14.7% of the 1,148 total saliva samples, or 2%-54% (M= 22%) of samples within each study. Recommendations to minimize the impact of stimluant interference in studies involving salivary cortisol in the context of child health and development are outlined.

Abstract: IgA antibodies reflecting airways or intestinal mucosal immune responses can be found in saliva and feces, respectively, and IgG antibodies reflecting serum antibodies can be found in saliva. In this study, antibodies were detected in samples of saliva and feces which had been air-dried at room temperature (+20°C) or +37°C, and stored at these temperatures for up to 6 months. In saliva the antibody levels increased, while the antibodies in feces decreased upon storage. The individual IgA antibody concentrations which were adjusted by using the ratios of specific IgA/total IgA were relatively stable in both saliva and feces, and correlated with corresponding antibody levels in samples which had been stored at -20°C. The results indicate that air-dried saliva and feces can be used for semiquantitative measurements of mucosal antibodies, even after prolonged storage at high temperatures and lack of refrigeration.

Abstract: Variation in the control region and the 12S rRNA gene of all surviving mitochondrial lineages of Przewalski's horse was investigated. Variation is low despite the present day population being descended from 13 individuals probably representing animals from three different regions of its range. Phylogenetic comparison of these sequences, with sequences for the domestic horse, does not resolve the ancestral status of either horse.