Ever wonder about the intelligence of various animals and how they measure up? Researchers at Vanderbilt University decided to find out. Specifically, they chose a subsection of mammals called carnivorans. This group has 250 species, each with sharp teeth and claws, which allow them to hunt other animals.
Scientists picked this group because it contains both carnivores and omnivores. It also has a wide range of domesticated and wild species. Carnivorans outsmart their prey, which was believed to be particularly demanding, cognitively. Because of this, it was assumed that they’d developed more sophisticated brains than herbivores—whose food doesn’t run or fight back. Plant eaters also tend to rely on safety in numbers. This study discovered something different, however.
To rightly compare brain power in species, it isn’t enough to weigh brain tissue. You must take into account the brain relative to the organism’s size. Something called the encephalization quotient has been used in the past to account for it. But this may fall short of evaluating actual intelligence, as it fails to account for the details of brain anatomy.
Researchers compared the brains of eight main species. Their findings are changing how we look at brain development. Credit: (Jeremy Teaford / Vanderbilt).
The number of neurons a brain has is associated with greater intelligence. So here, an international team of researchers measured the amount of gray matter in the cerebral cortex in one or two specimens from each of the eight main carnivoran species: dog, cat, ferret, mongoose, raccoon, hyena, lion, and brown bear.
Neuroscientist Suzana Herculano-Houzel from Vanderbilt University was a researcher on this study. She told Science Alert, “I believe the absolute number of neurons an animal has, especially in the cerebral cortex, determines the richness of their internal mental state and their ability to predict what is about to happen in their environment based on past experience.” She and colleagues found that carnivorans have about the same number of cortical neurons as herbivores. That means plant eaters need as much brain power to escape from predators as carnivores need…
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