Scientists at the University of Tübingen have found that crows can make certain visual decisions roughly twice as fast as humans and monkeys, according to findings published in the journal Current Biology. In experiments requiring the birds to identify the direction of moving dots, the crows responded in an average of just 235 milliseconds while maintaining remarkable accuracy. Researchers say the results suggest the birds' compact brains process sensory information with an efficiency that rivals, and in some respects exceeds, that of primates, challenging long-held assumptions about the relationship between brain size and cognitive speed.
The study adds to a growing body of evidence that corvids, a family that includes crows, ravens and jays, possess sophisticated cognitive abilities despite lacking the layered cerebral cortex associated with mammalian intelligence. Scientists believe the findings could inform broader research into how different brain architectures achieve rapid decision-making, with potential implications for neuroscience and artificial intelligence. The research team cautioned that the experiments measured only a narrow class of perceptual judgments and that further work is needed to determine whether crows' speed advantage extends to more complex reasoning tasks. The study has drawn widespread attention from researchers in comparative cognition.
Independent reporting synthesized from primary wires and global correspondents.