Cooperation, collaborators and cognition in ravens

Cooperation is a useful strategy to gain benefits that cannot be obtained alone, yet is characterized by risky investments. To deal with these uncertainties several mechanisms may have evolved. It has been argued that among group members or known individuals cooperation is unconsciously mediated by emotions. Yet, when dealing with unfamiliar individuals or strangers, human cooperation is governed by complex cognitive decisions involving the calculation of costs/benefits and the understanding of roles and intentions of collaborating individuals. Whether non-human animals also employ different decision rules for cooperation with either known or unknown individuals remains unknown. This study tests experimentally which behavioural decision rules ravens use in their cooperative behaviour with conspecifics of different familiarity. Ravens interact regularly with both familiar and unfamiliar conspecifics and are renowned for advanced socio-cognitive skills. The experiments aim to conceive whether ravens have a preference for cooperation with familiar individuals, whether they prefer an equal distribution of rewards for their cooperative act and whether ravens can calculate costs and benefits of their cooperation and act accordingly. Moreover, the experiments are complimented with an observational study on wild ravens, investigating the contingency of exchange patterns for different commodities in either familiar or unfamiliar dyads.

This research has increased our understanding about relationships among animals and its consequence for cooperation and cognition in these animals. First, it showed that among chimpanzees, good relationships or friendships are based on similarity in certain personality traits. As this is also true for humans it seems that our common ancestors might have had similar preferences for friends, and this then raises question about which other animals might share this mechanism in choosing their friends. Second, the research in this project showed that not only human behavioural biologists can recognise certain relationships among animals, but that ravens can also do this among their conspecifics. Moreover, the research showed that these ravens use such knowledge in a very political way when they for example avoid future competition by preventing others from forming alliances now. The project also showed that ravens cooperate better with those individuals with whom they have a better relationship. However, a different study showed that they are not very willing to help a conspecific when they dont gain anything themselves, even when it concerned their friends. Future research may show us if ravens are truly egoistic, or that in certain circumstances they do help their friends.