Video: Rats Choose to Liberate Their Jailed Pals, A Sign of Empathy Among Non-Primate Mammals
Don't Worry, I Got This The presence of a rat trapped in a restrainer elicits focused activity from his cagemate, who figures out how to open the door and liberates him. © Science/AAAS Given a choice between eating chocolate alone and rescuing their pals, rats will apparently save their pals and then share the chocolate with them. Trapping a rat in a cage sparks its cagemate into action, as it figures out how to open the cage and liberate its jailed friend. This is an unusual example of rats expressing empathy, a trait thought to be reserved to us higher mammals, the primates. It's interesting from an evolutionary perspective, because it suggests that pro-social behaviors originated earlier than previously thought. And it's interesting from a neuroscience perspective, because it suggests rats are wired for pro-social behaviors, which means they can be used as a model for human behaviors. "There are a lot of...