Aquatic Culture - Dolphins Communication

Lessons about our approach!
Some of the controversies around nonhuman animal communication has centered around the "Clever Hans" story. Clever Hans was a horse that was taught to "count", among other skills, by his trainer. When a psychologist observed this interaction, he noticed that the trainer was giving Hans subtle cues, everything from face nods to slight movements. Without these "cues", Hans could not perform properly. When the "double blind" method, not allowing the trainer or experimenter the knowledge of the answer, was applied to avoid the suspected exchange of subtle cues from trainer to animal, Clever Hans could not perform.

What does the Clever Hans phenomenon suggest about biological communication in general? Could it be that these "cues" are information bits that create complex communication in the first place? If so, then we are asking nonhuman animals to do what we cannot; to be restricted to one modality, such as gestural signs or acoustic cues, and learn a multi-modal language that involves these exact subtle cues. This perhaps, could be our biggest lesson about communication and might result in the creation of a more interactive and functionally expressive methodology for interspecies communication in the future.

Despite the continuum of methodologies in all primate interspecies work, most researchers agree that creating rapport with nonhuman subjects is critical to the animal's motivation for interacting and expressing themselves. Other species are capable of interacting and communicating on a variety of levels. Perhaps it is our human challenge to develop methodologies and sensitize ourselves to the motivation of other species to maximize our opportunity to make a connection.

Perhaps the similarities we find between species may turn out to be more critical than the differences. We might find levels of mental and social continuity and convergence across social species on our very own planet, Earth.

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