A new study shows that rats like to play hide and seek

17 Sep 2019

A new study shows that rats like to play hide and seek

A new study shows that rats like to play hide and seekRecently, a German scientist, Michael Brecht experimented by training a set of rats to play hide and seek. He has discovered that they enjoy playing the game.

Also, they have noticed that rats scream with joy when they win!

The study was published in the journal Science.

Mr Brecht is a neuroscientist and conducted this experiment in order to study play behaviour in animals.
 	Mr Brecht and his team began with 6 rats in a customised room fitted with boxes, in which the rats could hide.
 	The rats were trained to play hide and seek with humans for a couple of weeks.
 	Instead of rewarding the rats with food, they were tickled as a reward, for both hiding and finding the researchers.
 	Transparent boxes were also placed in the play area. But, surprisingly, the rats did not hide in them as they could be seen!
 	Sensors were attached to rats to observe which parts of the rats' brains were active during the game.

The researchers said that the rats 'laughing' when tickled and responding with empathy, have made them realise that humans and animals have many basic things in common.

The video of the rats playing hide and seek is becoming very popular on the internet!

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Recently, a German scientist, Michael Brecht experimented by training a set of rats to play hide and seek. He has discovered that they enjoy playing […]

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Comments: 3

Maahi says:

18 September 2019 at 10:06 pm

Very interesting

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- curioustimes says:
  
  18 September 2019 at 10:23 pm
  
  Hello Maahi.
  Glad you liked this article.
  
  Stay curious!
  
  Log in to Reply
shauryabatra says:

31 October 2019 at 8:04 am

i cant belive

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