Many people don’t know, but crows are arguably one of the smartest creatures on Earth. Crows are incredible animals with lots of different, unique characteristics. Studies have shown that crows perceive the world similarly to 5- to 7-year-olds. However, more recent studies have shown that crows can grasp some simple subjects, including geometry.
The crows were presented with arrays of six shapes on a touchscreen and were trained to pick the outlier. During the training, crows picked the outlier using colors and patterns. Next, they were with five groups of quadrilaterals: square, rhombus, isosceles trapezoid, right angle, an irregular quadrilateral, and an outlier of each.
Initially, the crows picked the outliers based on their patterns or colors, but eventually, they started picking the outliers using their features. The study continued, and the crows could distinguish between regular and irregular shapes, showing better performance with shapes featuring right angles, parallel lines, or symmetry.
Researchers made crows do small tasks or puzzles to test their cognitive abilities. They started on easy challenges and then moved on to harder ones as they realized they could solve them. Even without treats, crows continued to do the tasks, even though they just got harder and harder. Researchers found that even though crows have what it takes for harder tasks, they still have to find a way to get crows to develop their minds to solve geometry problems.
Scientists found that crows don’t have a cerebral cortex like humans do. The cerebral cortex helps people think and execute other important brain functions used to operate properly. This might be why crows still have to adapt to understand the concepts of geometry. Scientists still hope they can find a way to make the crows adapt their brains so they can solve complex problems.
Some scientists believe that more animals than crows can adapt to solve geometry, but for now, crows are the main focus. Early researchers have also found that crows can count up to four! Also, they found that crows also know how to differentiate between human voices and humans’ physical appearances, no matter how similar. These examples are just a few of what people have learned about crows. This proves how smart crows are, so much so that they may be able to do geometry that some humans can’t even solve yet. But for now, don’t be surprised if crows can be smarter than your seven-year-old cousin!