Sepia has been able to delay gratification, the first for invertebrates

The study, published Wednesday in Proceedings of the Royal Society B, places cuttlefish in the ranks of larger-brained vertebrates such as great apes, parrots and corvids in terms of how long they can delay gratification and turns them into the first invertebrates to demonstrate self-control. , Reported Live Science.

“Self-control is believed to be the cornerstone of intelligence, as it is an important prerequisite for complex decision-making and future planning,” the lead and associate author of Live Science told Live Science. research in psychology from the University of Cambridge.

The marshmallow experiment was first conducted at Stanford by Walter Mischel in the 1960s. To test the mechanisms behind self-control, children were able to choose between taking a marshmallow or other gift, now, or waiting 15 to 20 minutes to get two. Recent research has called into question the idea that children’s ability to wait determines success later in life, as The Atlantic explained. In contrast, both this capacity and subsequent successes can be explained by external factors such as economic stability. Still, that hasn’t stopped the test from becoming a viral meme among quarantined tired parents, as Buzzfeed explained.

For cuttlefish, the reward had to be slightly modified. Instead of sugary sweets, cuttlefish could choose between a favorite food like grass prawns or prawns or a less favorite food like Asian crab, Live Science explained. They presented them with two drawers. One that opened immediately with the least favorite food and that opened after a delay with the favorite food. If they chose the first option, the second snack would disappear.

“The cuttlefish in the present study were able to wait for a better reward and tolerated delays of up to 50-130 seconds, which is comparable to what we see in large-brained vertebrates such as chimpanzees, crows and parrots,” he said. dir Schnell at Laboratory of Marine Biology (MBL), where the research was conducted.

The researchers also tested the intelligence of cuttlefish and found that cuttlefish that could wait longer for their favorite foods also did better in a learning test. This marks the first time that intelligence and self-control have been related in a different animal from humans or chimpanzees.

However, Schnell and his colleagues are unsure why cuttlefish need self-control. For social animals such as parrots, crows, apes and humans, it is important for group solidarity. For example, humans wait to eat to share meal times. It can also be important for animals that build tools that need patience to build a tool before hunting.

Researchers hypothesize that in cuttlefish self-control has a different function.

“Cuttlefish spend most of their time camouflaging themselves, sitting and waiting, marked by short periods of eating,” Schnell told MBL. “They break camouflage when they feed, so they are exposed to all ocean predators who want to eat them. We speculate that delayed satisfaction may have evolved as a byproduct of this, so cuttlefish may optimize the food waiting to choose a better quality food “.

The fact that both camouflaged cuttlefish and social apes need self-control is an example of something called convergent evolution, a process in which animals develop the same traits through different mechanisms.

Correction: An earlier version of this story said the study was published Thursday. It has been updated to say it was released on Wednesday, March 3rd.