United States
£ GBP
An absorbing study of how birds think, revealing how science is exploding the myth of our feathered friends being 'bird brained', and how recent discoveries may call for us to re-evaluate how we identify and classify intelligence in other animals. Bird Brain will start by looking at the structures and functions of the avian brain, and move on to examine different types of intelligence by profiling the extraordinary behaviours of a broad range of the species, studying the masterminds of the avian world, and examining what types of behaviour can be interpreted as 'intelligence' as we would recognize it. Bird Brain will not only look at the well-studied species such as New Caledonian crows and parrots, but also cast a broader eye over the behaviour of a wide range of species from around the world.
Dr. Nathan Emery (Cambridge, UK), is Senior Lecturer in Cognitive Biology at Queen Mary University of London. His research interests have focused on the cognitive abilities of corvids, apes and parrots, and he is currently working with the ravens at the Tower of London. He has authored two previous books and is on the editorial boards of Animal Cognition and the Journal of Comparative Psychology. His work has been extensively reported internationally.
"This is an extensive introductory review of the subject of intelligence in birds, with lots of pictures. It is neither an academic textbook or a coffee table potboiler, but pitched very much inbetween. [...]a very attractive introduction to quite a complex and fast moving area of research."
– Peter Lack, BTO book reviews
