End of Week 4
- Kelly Ngo
- Jul 18, 2021
- 2 min read
This week, we located research studies and literature reviews.
Article 1: Research Study
Audet, Jean-Nicolas, et al. “Bajan Birds Pull Strings: Two Wild Antillean Species Enter the Select Club of String-Pullers.” PLOS ONE, Public Library of Science, https://journals.plos.org/plosone/article?id=10.1371/journal.pone.0156112#sec002
I already knew that I wanted to emphasize on the intelligence of birds through a string test, as seen in the Bird Brain documentary. I searched up the terms “birds string test” and “birds pull string” on Google Scholar to find this article. In this research study, they tested wild-caught individuals from two species that have not been previously examined, Barbados bullfinches Loxigilla barbadensis and Carib grackles Quiscalus lugubris fortirostris. They are both Barbadian species. They also correlated the performance of the string pull to results on different tests. The method included a cylindrical container that was attached to a wooden perch, with a string. It prevented the bird to fly to the reward. There were various amounts of trials. In the end, they concluded that the string-pulling task involves different skills that differ from a mix of memory, motivation, persistence that affect performance in problem solving.
Article 2: Literature Review
Emery, Nathan J. “Cognitive Ornithology: the Evolution of Avian Intelligence.” Philosophical Transactions of the Royal Society of London. Series B, Biological Sciences, The Royal Society, 29 Jan. 2006, www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC1626540/.
I found this article by searching up Nathan Emery on Google Scholar. I saw that this article has been cited by 462 others. The specific area of research it is summarizing is how evolution has changed avian brain size. The writer has done research that focuses on animal intelligence and the evolution of cognition, particularly in corvids, parrots, monkeys and apes. The author’s overall perspective on this is that rather than shared ancestry, the different brains evolved through convergent evolution.
Overall, I learned a lot about going through the libraries to find specific topics. The filter option was very useful to narrow down the research. Although I also tried out Academic Scholar Complete, I found Google Scholar to be easier to use.
Hi Kelly,
I like how you were able to summarize your articles in such a compact yet informative manner. I do wish, however, that you would have gone a bit more into depth as to how the writer of the literature review article utilizes other sources. Does he agree or disagree with the majority of specialists in the field? I too found google scholar easier to use. It is pretty straightforward and doesn't require too many filter adjustments.
Hey Kelly! I also found that Google Scholar is easier to use, probably cause I'm more familiar with the website. However, I will still be using Academic Search Complete since it was very useful as well as it had a link, pdfs, and a citation that we can use. Ever since I watched the documentary "Bird Brain," I have always been intrigued by birds' intelligence. I believe your first source is very useful since it consists of an experiment to show how birds can use problem solving skills to pull on the string to get the reward. Your second source also talks about how the brain may affect their intelligence (in a good way) through evolution. I think your sources…
Hi Kelly! I thought you did a great job summarizing the articles and finding the best ones for your topic. I think these sources will definitely help you for your study on bird intelligence.