• Email Us: [email protected]
  • Contact Us: +1 718 874 1545
  • Skip to main content
  • Skip to primary sidebar

Medical Market Report

  • Home
  • All Reports
  • About Us
  • Contact Us

Mice Have Passed The Mirror Test, Suggesting They Might Have Self-Recognition

December 6, 2023 by Deborah Bloomfield

Originally developed as a test of consciousness in different species, the mirror test has since become an indicator that a creature recognizes its reflection as itself. Now, researchers have potentially welcomed a new member to the self-recognition club: mice.

Placing a dollop of black or white ink on the foreheads of black-furred mice, a team of researchers then placed individual mice in a box with a mirror and started recording them. Observations revealed that mice with white spots on their heads spent more time grooming their heads whilst in front of the mirror. On the surface, this would suggest that the mice were able to detect the change in their appearance, and thus are capable of self-recognition, joining the likes of humans, chimpanzees, and fish.

Advertisement

However, the researchers caution that this doesn’t necessarily mean that mice are “self-aware”. They also found that the mice could only detect the spots under certain conditions: being accustomed to mirrors, having spent time socializing with other mice that looked like them, and if the blob of ink on their heads was relatively large.



“The mice required significant external sensory cues to pass the mirror test – we have to put a lot of ink on their heads, and then the tactile stimulus coming from the ink somehow enables the animal to detect the ink on their heads via a mirror reflection,” said first author Jun Yokose in a statement. “Chimps and humans don’t need any of that extra sensory stimulus.”

The team also sought to identify the neural basis for the behavior resembling self-recognition. They identified a subset of neurons in the hippocampus, which they found were activated when the mice appeared to recognize themselves in the mirror. To confirm the neurons played a role in this behavior, the team made them non-functional, after which the mice stopped displaying it.

Advertisement

The researchers further suggest that socialization may be key to the mice developing self-recognizing behaviors, with socially isolated mice displaying no increase in grooming behaviors during the mirror and ink test. There were also clues in the analysis of neurons. 

“A subset of these self-responding neurons was also reactivated when we exposed the mice to other individuals of the same strain,” said senior author Takashi Kitamura. “This is consistent with previous human literature that showed that some hippocampal cells fire not only when the person is looking at themselves, but also when they look at familiar people like a parent.”

The next step for the team is to figure out if mice can still recognize changes to their appearance in the absence of tactile stimulation; cold, wet ink on their heads may well have alerted them to the fact. One suggestion is to use filters similar to those seen on social media – a study with images of mice with little bunny ears or cartoonishly large eyes would be worthwhile indeed. It’s also hoped they can identify other brain regions that could be involved in self-recognition.

“Now that we have this mouse model, we can manipulate or monitor neural activity to comprehensively investigate the neural circuit mechanisms behind how self-recognition-like behavior is induced in mice,” said Yokose.

Advertisement

The study is published in the journal Neuron.

Deborah Bloomfield
Deborah Bloomfield

Related posts:

  1. Soccer – FIFA backs down on threat to fine Premier clubs who play South American players
  2. U.S. House passes abortion rights bill, outlook poor in Senate
  3. Two children killed in missile strikes on Yemen’s Marib – state news agency
  4. We’ve Breached Six Of The Nine “Planetary Boundaries” For Sustaining Human Civilization

Source Link: Mice Have Passed The Mirror Test, Suggesting They Might Have Self-Recognition

Filed Under: News

Primary Sidebar

  • These Strange Little Lizards Have Toxic Green Blood, And No One Knows Exactly Why
  • How Does 2-In-1 Shampoo And Conditioner Work?
  • There Are 2-Billion-Year-Old “Millennium Rocks” In A Suburb, Hundreds Of Miles From Their Primeval Home
  • “That’s A Hellfire Missile Smacking Into That UFO”: Strange Video Emerges From US UAP Hearing
  • In 40,000 Years, Voyager 1 Will Have A Close Encounter With Gliese 445
  • Abnormally Long Gamma Ray Burst Unlike Anything We’ve Seen Before Baffles Astronomers
  • Critically Endangered Shark Meat Is Being Sold In US Stores For As Little As $2.99
  • Infectious Mouth Bacteria Lurking In Artery Plaques Could Be Behind Some Heart Attacks
  • What Would You Reach If You Kept Digging Under Antarctica?
  • First Visible Time Crystals Ever Made Have Astonishing Complexity And Practical Potential
  • “Something Undeniably Special”: The Chi Cygnids, A New Five-Yearly Meteor Shower, Peak This Month
  • A 200-Meter-Tall Event We Didn’t See Sent Signals Through The Earth For Nine Whole Days
  • Why Are So Many Volcanoes Underwater?
  • In 1977, A Hybrid Was Born In A Zoo. What It Taught Us Could Save One Of The Planet’s Most Endangered Species
  • How To Park A Dangerous Asteroid So It Doesn’t Bite You Later
  • New Study Finds Evidence For What Every Parent Knows About Bluey
  • New Breakthrough Takes Plastic Garbage And Turns It Into Tool For Carbon Capture
  • NASA To Hold Press Conference About New Perseverance Rover Discovery Tomorrow
  • Strange Halos Have Formed Around Barrels Of Chemicals Dumped Off LA’s Coast Over 50 Years Ago
  • As We Grow Older, Our Music Taste Appears To Narrow To Fewer Songs
  • Business
  • Health
  • News
  • Science
  • Technology
  • +1 718 874 1545
  • +91 78878 22626
  • [email protected]
Office Address
Prudour Pvt. Ltd. 420 Lexington Avenue Suite 300 New York City, NY 10170.

Powered by Prudour Network

Copyrights © 2025 · Medical Market Report. All Rights Reserved.

Go to mobile version