How rude nobody has replied about this.
Anyway, I suppose the point is the 1970's mirror test is ill-performed psychobabble and the people who performed these tests probably didn't have bonds with their animals or the ability to train or educate them. They must have just plonked wild animals in front of mirrors without trying to teach them the mirror = them.
Cockatiels are self-aware! At least mine is.. and he is not particularly bright either. He's a male pearl who probably has very slightly below average intelligence due to inbreeding for that variety. I.e. he doesn't ever talk, and has a small song repertoire. So if my tiel can learn self-awareness, I'm sure other tiels can too.
How does my tiel feel about being self-aware? DEPRESSED 😀
After learning the mirror is him and waving the mirror in front of him for a minute or two, he looks sad and depressed on his perch after seeing himself. I don't know why! He is beautiful
This is not to suggest though that any wild cockatiel are self-aware. Their lives in the wild are so simple and fast-paced in comparison. But I think in captivity we can extract some further intelligence out of them with lots of stimulation and understanding
Interestingly while wild eurasian magpies have passed the mirror test without training, pigeons HAVE passed it but only with training from humans.
So I suppose cockatiel intelligence can be equated to that of a pigeon (no surprise there).
Here is another report of cockatiel self-awareness for anybody interested which is even more supportive than my experience:
Anyway, I suppose the point is the 1970's mirror test is ill-performed psychobabble and the people who performed these tests probably didn't have bonds with their animals or the ability to train or educate them. They must have just plonked wild animals in front of mirrors without trying to teach them the mirror = them.
Cockatiels are self-aware! At least mine is.. and he is not particularly bright either. He's a male pearl who probably has very slightly below average intelligence due to inbreeding for that variety. I.e. he doesn't ever talk, and has a small song repertoire. So if my tiel can learn self-awareness, I'm sure other tiels can too.
How does my tiel feel about being self-aware? DEPRESSED 😀
After learning the mirror is him and waving the mirror in front of him for a minute or two, he looks sad and depressed on his perch after seeing himself. I don't know why! He is beautiful
This is not to suggest though that any wild cockatiel are self-aware. Their lives in the wild are so simple and fast-paced in comparison. But I think in captivity we can extract some further intelligence out of them with lots of stimulation and understanding
Interestingly while wild eurasian magpies have passed the mirror test without training, pigeons HAVE passed it but only with training from humans.
So I suppose cockatiel intelligence can be equated to that of a pigeon (no surprise there).
Here is another report of cockatiel self-awareness for anybody interested which is even more supportive than my experience:
