Compiled by: Mintina, the tiny bees playing football games raise some questions about the inner life of invertebrates. The researchers observed the bumblebee rolling wooden balls for no other reason, but just to make fun of the photo provided: Richard Rickitt researchers say the

Compilation: Mintina

The bee playing football games raises some questions about the inner life of invertebrates.

Researchers observed bumblebees rolling wooden balls, and there seemed to be no other reason, but just to make fun of
Photo provided: Richard Rickitt

Researchers said bumblebees became the first insect known to play "games". Scientists recorded these small flying insects rolling wooden balls at a time in a series of experiments.

When animals repeatedly display a behavior that has nothing to do with food, shelter, or other immediate benefits, researchers believe it is a demand for the game. People have been closely watching animals play with lifeless objects, and although most of the examples are derived from mammals and birds, there has been no relevant records about insects until now.

Animals play games are a puzzle, which can determine whether a group of animals also has such perceptions - whether these groups have inner feelings and experiences. Scientists believe that mammals, birds and cephalopods are species that feel so. “Ultimately, this can tell us more about whether [insects] fall into this category as well,” said Samadi Galpayage, a graduate student at Lars Chittka lab at Queen Mary University in London and the lead author of the brand new Bumblebee study published in Animal Behaviour last Thursday.

In 2017, Chittka and other scientists used sweet foods as rewards to teach Bumblebee Rolling. To determine whether Rolling is a “game” form in the brand new study, Galpayage, Chittka and their colleagues need to remove the reward. First, they built a system that allows bumblebees to go to the feeding area to obtain sucrose. Next to the passage, the researchers placed small wooden balls of various colors, partly close together, while others were scattered between them. Bumblebee gets sucrose without interacting with the wood ball at all.

Video record Bumblebee rolling balls propeling wooden balls at half speed
Photo provided: "Can bumblebee play? Hiruni Samadi Galpayage Dona et al, published online on October 19, 2022 (CC BY 4.0)

In more than 54 hours, the team observed each of the 45 bees in the experiment, and the insects performed 910 rounds of balls. Some bees returned time and time again, moving the balls in multiple ways. The researchers found that feeding and ball activities appeared at different times and vary greatly, which showed that bees had different motivations for the two activities. Younger bees and male bees were particularly interested in balls.

In a subsequent experiment, scientists trained the large ring peak to turn the wooden ball into a specific color ball chamber. Bees then tended to choose the color ball chamber, even if there was nothing left.

Galpayage said the result showed bees’ gaming behavior, and the study had no expectations. For example, deciding whether insects play because of interest required analyzing changes in their neurotransmitters (transmitting information between nerve cells or to muscles) during the rolling ball.

Olli Loukola, a behavioral ecologist at the University of Oulu in Finland, led a scientist in 2017 to promote the study of spheres, but those who were not involved in the study also wanted to understand the ultimate meaning of these behaviors. He said that the interest of moving objects was driven by the need to “innately develop mobility capabilities.”

Heather Browning, an animal health professional and philosopher at Southampton University in the UK, said that regardless of the game’s outcome, this helps researchers determine whether a species has such a perception (game) presence.

“We have not yet had a good understanding of the connection between perception and different behaviors,” Browning said, and he was not involved in the study. For a lot of evidence of different personalities, such as game behavior, complex brain construction and learning ability “increase the possibility of perception.”

Browning adds that the study “this seems to point in this direction.” ”


Information source: Grace van Deelen