LONDON: Whales and dolphins are living in tightly-knit social teams, have advanced relationships, keep in touch with each other or even have regional dialects - similar to human societies - a study has found.
The study is first of its sort to create a big dataset of cetacean brain size and social behaviours.
Researchers, including the ones from the University of British Columbia in Canada and The London School of Economics and Political Science (LSE) in the United Kingdom, compiled information on 90 other species of dolphins, whales and porpoises.
It found overwhelming proof that Cetaceans have subtle social and cooperative behaviour characteristics, similar to many found in the human culture.
The study, published in the magazine Nature Ecology and Evolution, demonstrates that those societal and cultural traits are related with brain size and brain enlargement - sometimes called encephalisation.
The list of behavioural similarities contains many characteristics shared with people and other primates, comparable to advanced alliance relationships and dealing together for mutual get advantages.
Researchers also found the social transfer of hunting techniques - educating each other the best way to hunt and using tools ocooperative hunting.
The Cetaceans also showcase advanced vocalisations, including regional crew dialects - vocal mimicry and 'signature whistles' distinctive to folks. They also take care of children that are not their own.
"As humans, our ability to socially interact and cultivate relationships has allowed us to colonise almost every ecosystem and environment on the planet," mentioned Susanne Shultz, from the University of Manchester in the United Kingdom.
"We know whales and dolphins also have exceptionally large and anatomically sophisticated brains and, therefore, have created a similar marine-based culture," Shultz mentioned.
"That means the apparent co-evolution of brains, social structure, and behavioural richness of marine mammals provides a unique and striking parallel to the large brains and hyper-sociality of humans and other primates on land," she mentioned.
The workforce used the dataset to test the social brain hypothesis (SBH) and cultural brain hypothesis (CBH).
The SBH and CBH are evolutionary theories firstly advanced to give an explanation for massive brains in primates and land mammals.
They argue that giant brains are an evolutionary response to advanced and information-rich social environments.
However, this is the primary time those hypotheses have been carried out to 'clever' marine mammals on any such massive scale.
"Cetaceans have many complex social behaviours that are similar to humans and other primates," mentioned Kieran Fox, at Stanford University in the US.
They, on the other hand, have other brain buildings from us, leading some researchers to argue that whales and dolphins may just now not achieve higher cognitive and social abilities. I believe our analysis presentations that this is clearly now not the case," mentioned Fox.
The study is first of its sort to create a big dataset of cetacean brain size and social behaviours.
Researchers, including the ones from the University of British Columbia in Canada and The London School of Economics and Political Science (LSE) in the United Kingdom, compiled information on 90 other species of dolphins, whales and porpoises.
It found overwhelming proof that Cetaceans have subtle social and cooperative behaviour characteristics, similar to many found in the human culture.
The study, published in the magazine Nature Ecology and Evolution, demonstrates that those societal and cultural traits are related with brain size and brain enlargement - sometimes called encephalisation.
The list of behavioural similarities contains many characteristics shared with people and other primates, comparable to advanced alliance relationships and dealing together for mutual get advantages.
Researchers also found the social transfer of hunting techniques - educating each other the best way to hunt and using tools ocooperative hunting.
The Cetaceans also showcase advanced vocalisations, including regional crew dialects - vocal mimicry and 'signature whistles' distinctive to folks. They also take care of children that are not their own.
"As humans, our ability to socially interact and cultivate relationships has allowed us to colonise almost every ecosystem and environment on the planet," mentioned Susanne Shultz, from the University of Manchester in the United Kingdom.
"We know whales and dolphins also have exceptionally large and anatomically sophisticated brains and, therefore, have created a similar marine-based culture," Shultz mentioned.
"That means the apparent co-evolution of brains, social structure, and behavioural richness of marine mammals provides a unique and striking parallel to the large brains and hyper-sociality of humans and other primates on land," she mentioned.
The workforce used the dataset to test the social brain hypothesis (SBH) and cultural brain hypothesis (CBH).
The SBH and CBH are evolutionary theories firstly advanced to give an explanation for massive brains in primates and land mammals.
They argue that giant brains are an evolutionary response to advanced and information-rich social environments.
However, this is the primary time those hypotheses have been carried out to 'clever' marine mammals on any such massive scale.
"Cetaceans have many complex social behaviours that are similar to humans and other primates," mentioned Kieran Fox, at Stanford University in the US.
They, on the other hand, have other brain buildings from us, leading some researchers to argue that whales and dolphins may just now not achieve higher cognitive and social abilities. I believe our analysis presentations that this is clearly now not the case," mentioned Fox.
Whales, dolphins have human-like 'cultures': Study
![Whales, dolphins have human-like 'cultures': Study]()
Reviewed by Kailash
on
October 22, 2017
Rating:
