ArticleProceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of the United States of America2016
Brain size predicts problem-solving ability in mammalian carnivores.
Article in Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of the United States of America, 2016. The graph could read no effect estimate from its abstract, so it casts no vote on the map. Cited by 124 papers.
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Who cites it
124 citing papers in PubMed.
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- Wolves respond differently to human cues as they expand into urban landscapes.Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of the United States of America · 2026Article
- Deficiency of vital organic nutrients in ecosystems limits brain development and fitness in wild fish.The Journal of experimental biology · 2026Article
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- Quick on their paws: mice living in human-disturbed areas are faster problem-solvers than mice in strictly protected areas.Animal cognition · 2025Article
- Social fish have larger brains and greater relative telencephalon sizes: support for the social brain hypothesis from wild, intraspecific comparisons.Proceedings. Biological sciences · 2025Article
- Tolerant and despotic macaques show divergent temperament but similar theory of mind.Philosophical transactions of the Royal Society of London. Series B, Biological sciences · 2025Article
- Does the Post-Natal Social Environment Influence Cognitive Development in a Social Gecko?Ecology and evolution · 2025Article
- Wild and zoo-housed orangutans differ in how they explore objects.Scientific reports · 2025Article
- Assessment of Oxidative Stress and Associated Biomarkers in Wild Avian Species.Animals : an open access journal from MDPI · 2025Review
- The Relationship Between Relative Brain Size and Avoidance of Vehicular Collisions in Birds is Subtle.Zoological studies · 2025Article
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- Evolution of Plasticity in Brain Morphology.Brain, behavior and evolution · 2025Review
- Beyond the mosaic model of brain evolution: Rearing environment defines local and global plasticity.Annals of the New York Academy of Sciences · 2024Article
- Breed function and behaviour correlate with endocranial volume in domestic dogs.Biology letters · 2024Article
64 more citing papers are in PubMed but not listed here.
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Authors and funding
5 authors.
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No grant is acknowledged in the PubMed record.
Abstract
Despite considerable interest in the forces shaping the relationship between brain size and cognitive abilities, it remains controversial whether larger-brained animals are, indeed, better problem-solvers. Recently, several comparative studies have revealed correlations between brain size and traits thought to require advanced cognitive abilities, such as innovation, behavioral flexibility, invasion success, and self-control. However, the general assumption that animals with larger brains have superior cognitive abilities has been heavily criticized, primarily because of the lack of experimental support for it. Here, we designed an experiment to inquire whether specific neuroanatomical or socioecological measures predict success at solving a novel technical problem among species in the mammalian order Carnivora. We presented puzzle boxes, baited with food and scaled to accommodate body size, to members of 39 carnivore species from nine families housed in multiple North American zoos. We found that species with larger brains relative to their body mass were more successful at opening the boxes. In a subset of species, we also used virtual brain endocasts to measure volumes of four gross brain regions and show that some of these regions improve model prediction of success at opening the boxes when included with total brain size and body mass. Socioecological variables, including measures of social complexity and manual dexterity, failed to predict success at opening the boxes. Our results, thus, fail to support the social brain hypothesis but provide important empirical support for the relationship between relative brain size and the ability to solve this novel technical problem.
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