Abstract: In non-human animals, creative behaviour occurs spontaneously only at low frequencies, so is typically missed by standardised observational methods. Experimental approaches have tended to rely overly on paradigms from child development or adult human cognition, which may be inappropriate for species that inhabit very different perceptual worlds and possess quite different motor capacities than humans. The analysis of anecdotes offers a solution to this impasse, provided certain conditions are met. To be reliable, anecdotes must be recorded immediately after observation, and only the records of scientists experienced with the species and the individuals concerned should be used. Even then, interpretation of a single record is always ambiguous, and analysis is feasible only when collation of multiple records shows that a behaviour pattern occurs repeatedly under similar circumstances. This approach has been used successfully to study a number of creative capacities of animals: the distribution, nature and neural correlates of deception across the primate order; the occurrence of teaching in animals; and the neural correlates of several aptitudes--in birds, foraging innovation, and in primates, innovation, social learning and tool-use. Drawing on these approaches, we describe the use of this method to investigate a new problem, the cognition of the African elephant, a species whose sheer size and evolutionary distance from humans renders the conventional methods of comparative psychology of little use. The aim is both to chart the creative cognitive capacities of this species, and to devise appropriate experimental methods to confirm and extend previous findings.

Abstract: Abstract The role of leader in polygynous species has been solely attributed to the male for some time, but recent studies shown decision making to be distributed within the group. However, the specific reproductive strategy and behavioural repertoire of males in polygynous species such as horses may mean that these individuals still have the potential to play a specific role during decision-making. To investigate this subject, we thoroughly studied the behaviour of two domestic stallions during collective movements of their group. We found that they initiated rarely and sometimes failed to recruit the entire group. When departing as followers, they did not accelerate the joining process. Both stallions preferentially occupied the rear position and exhibited numerous monitoring behaviours. Herding behaviours were performed by only one stallion and mostly occurred outside movement context. Finally, we removed this herding stallion from its group to evaluate how the group dynamic changed. As a result, half of the collective movements were five times slower and mares were more dispersed in comparison when the stallion was in the group. Overall, our results suggest that, the two stallions maintained their role of group monitors from departure to arrival. Their influence on the movement dynamic was indirect and did not play a specific role in the process of decision making.

Abstract: In the USA, each year, up to one billion birds are estimated to die from colliding with windowpanes (Sabo et al. 2016). A further 573,000 are struck down by wind turbines, along with 888,000 bats (Smallwood 2013). Worldwide, unintended capture in fishing devices is recognized as the single most serious global threat to migratory, long-lived marine taxa including turtles, birds, mammals and sharks (Wallace et al. 2013). Estimates put the number of amphibians killed per year on Australian roads at 5 million (Seiler 2003). The likelihood of a green turtle erroneously ingesting plastic debris, often by mistaking them for food, rose from 30% in 1985 to almost 50% in 2012 (Schuyler et al. 2013). Human-induced rapid environmental change (HIREC, sensu Sih et al. 2011) is filling animals’ environments with new threats which bear little or excessive similarity to those they have encountered in their evolutionary history (Dwernychuk and Boag 1972; Patten and Kelley 2010; Witherington 1997). As a consequence, many of the stimuli involved fall outside the adaptive processing space of animals’ evolutionary perceptual, learning, memory and decision-making systems, making individuals particularly vulnerable to their impact.

Abstract: Left-cradling bias is a distinctive feature of maternal behaviour in humans and great apes, but its evolutionary origin remains unknown. In 11 species of marine and terrestrial mammal, we demonstrate consistent patterns of lateralization in mother�infant interactions, indicating right hemisphere dominance for social processing. In providing clear evidence that lateralized positioning is beneficial in mother�infant interactions, our results illustrate a significant impact of lateralization on individual fitness.