{"id":42384,"date":"2025-02-11T01:28:41","date_gmt":"2025-02-11T07:28:41","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/lafeber.com\/pet-birds\/?p=42384"},"modified":"2026-01-19T12:55:51","modified_gmt":"2026-01-19T18:55:51","slug":"new-study-do-parrots-follow-the-crowd","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/lafeber.com\/pet-birds\/new-study-do-parrots-follow-the-crowd\/","title":{"rendered":"New Study: Do Parrots Follow The Crowd?"},"content":{"rendered":"
\"blue-throated
A pair of blue-throated macaws. Eric Kilby from Somerville, MA, USA<\/a>, CC BY-SA 2.0<\/a>, via Wikimedia Commons<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

Science is awash in studies that look at behavioral patterns in animals, including parrots. Researchers attempt to match those behaviors to learned habits, or to dive deeper to discover if such behaviors are inherent and part of the animal’s complex makeup. Parrot owners everywhere are witnesses to incredible behaviors that oftentimes amaze them. And then there are copied behaviors that yield little-to-no usefulness and may even seem counterproductive. Humans often follow the crowd behavior. It seems parrots do it, too.<\/p>\n

Parrots As Copycats<\/strong><\/p>\n

Researchers from the Max Planck Institute, along with two German Universities and a Spanish Foundation, have submitted a research paper on the reality that macaws often show automatic imitation of their kind<\/a> even if the imitation yielded no specific reward or advancement. In short, they were influenced by their peers to do things even if they were encouraged to do otherwise.<\/p>\n

The researchers set up a location and enlisted the training and study of seven macaws. They were trained to do two different actions with their legs and their wings when given specific hand signals. The birds were divided into two groupings \u2013 compatible and incompatible. The compatible group was rewarded when they performed the same actions as their other members, while the incompatible group was rewarded when the birds responded with a completely different action. The results yielded more errors in the incompatible group, as they all too often imitated the others.<\/p>\n

Humans are known to reproduce behaviors in their chosen peer groups if it corresponds to what they have aligned themselves to. Such imitations lead to accepted cultural traditions and rituals, both of which change as we evolve. This action occurs by what we call \u201cmirror neurons,\u201d neurons that initiate when actions are seen and encourages replication for no apparent reason or value achievement. Such replication of casual actions indicates the bird\u2019s strong social behavior. In studying to see if birds are just as susceptible to \u201cfollowing the crowd,\u201d the discovery revealed that they are.<\/p>\n

In the incompatible group, the birds took a long time to realize that a specific response was required of them. Instead, they typically watched what the others were doing and replicated that response. With the study discovery that birds may be operating under the socially driven \u201cmirror neuron\u201d recognized in humans, we are coming to an even greater understandings of the bird mind.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

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