Bottlenose dolphins cooperate in a variety of contexts, including foraging,acquiring mates, playing, and assisting distressed conspecifics. To better understand the capacity for cooperative behaviors, animals are often given tasks that require pairs of animals to coordinate their actions in order to receive a reward. This paper reports the results of an aquatic version of one such task: cooperative rope-pulling. Three groups of captive bottlenose dolphins (Tursiops truncatus) were given an apparatus that could most easily be opened by the two animals working together. Two untrained adult males at one location were successful in opening the apparatus together, sharing the food and engaging in cooperative behaviors following their success. These results demonstrate that dolphins can solve a novel task via cooperation, but the failure of the other dolphins to do so suggests that personality, dominance, and social structure influence willingness to cooperate.
Doctoral Dissertation: http://aquila.usm.edu/dissertations/359/
","abstract_html":"<p>Bottlenose dolphins cooperate in a variety of contexts, including foraging,acquiring mates, playing, and assisting distressed conspecifics. To better understand the capacity for cooperative behaviors, animals are often given tasks that require pairs of animals to coordinate their actions in order to receive a reward. This paper reports the results of an aquatic version of one such task: cooperative rope-pulling. Three groups of captive bottlenose dolphins (<em>Tursiops truncatus</em>) were given an apparatus that could most easily be opened by the two animals working together. Two untrained adult males at one location were successful in opening the apparatus together, sharing the food and engaging in cooperative behaviors following their success. These results demonstrate that dolphins can solve a novel task via cooperation, but the failure of the other dolphins to do so suggests that personality, dominance, and social structure influence willingness to cooperate.</p> <p>Doctoral Dissertation: <a href="http://aquila.usm.edu/dissertations/359/">http://aquila.usm.edu/dissertations/359/</a></p>","abstract_has_math":false,"creators":["Winship, Kelley Ann"],"institution":null,"degree_name":"Master of Arts (MA)","degree_level":"Masters Thesis","degree_discipline":"Psychology","degree_department":null,"school":null,"contributors":["Stanley A. Kuczaj III","John Harsh","Holli Byerly"],"advisors":[],"committee_chairs":[],"committee_members":[],"year":2015,"date_issued":"2015-05-01T07:00:00Z","date_published":"2015-05-01T07:00:00Z","updated_at":"2026-07-24T05:44:27Z","subjects":["dolphin","cooperation","problem solving","cognition","Tursiops Truncatus","Cognitive Psychology","Psychology","Social and Behavioral Sciences"],"languages":[],"rights":[],"rights_urls":[],"identifier_entries":[]},"links":{"outbound_url":"https://aquila.usm.edu/masters_theses/78","outbound_label":"Repository record","outbound_source":"dc:identifier"},"metadata_groups":[{"id":"people","label":"People","entries":[{"key":"dc:contributor","label":"Contributor","values":["Stanley A. Kuczaj III","John Harsh","Holli Byerly"]},{"key":"dc:creator","label":"Author","values":["Winship, Kelley Ann"]}]},{"id":"academic_context","label":"Academic Context","entries":[{"key":"dc:date.available","label":"Dc Date Available","values":["2016-01-09T08:00:00Z"]},{"key":"thesis:degree_discipline","label":"Discipline","values":["Psychology"]},{"key":"thesis:degree_level","label":"Degree Level","values":["Masters Thesis"]},{"key":"thesis:degree_name","label":"Degree Name","values":["Master of Arts (MA)"]}]},{"id":"subjects_keywords","label":"Subjects and Keywords","entries":[{"key":"dc:subject","label":"Dc Subject","values":["dolphin","cooperation","problem solving","cognition","Tursiops Truncatus","Cognitive Psychology","Psychology","Social and Behavioral Sciences"]}]},{"id":"identifiers","label":"Identifiers","entries":[{"key":"dc:identifier","label":"Identifier","values":["https://aquila.usm.edu/masters_theses/78"]}]},{"id":"additional","label":"Additional Metadata","entries":[{"key":"dc:description.abstract","label":"Abstract","values":["Bottlenose dolphins cooperate in a variety of contexts, including foraging,acquiring mates, playing, and assisting distressed conspecifics. To better understand the capacity for cooperative behaviors, animals are often given tasks that require pairs of animals to coordinate their actions in order to receive a reward. This paper reports the results of an aquatic version of one such task: cooperative rope-pulling. Three groups of captive bottlenose dolphins (Tursiops truncatus) were given an apparatus that could most easily be opened by the two animals working together. Two untrained adult males at one location were successful in opening the apparatus together, sharing the food and engaging in cooperative behaviors following their success. These results demonstrate that dolphins can solve a novel task via cooperation, but the failure of the other dolphins to do so suggests that personality, dominance, and social structure influence willingness to cooperate.
Doctoral Dissertation: http://aquila.usm.edu/dissertations/359/
"]},{"key":"dc:title","label":"Title","values":["Can Dolphins Cooperate to Solve a Novel Task?"]}]}],"canonical_facts":{"dc:contributor":["Stanley A. Kuczaj III","John Harsh","Holli Byerly"],"dc:creator":["Winship, Kelley Ann"],"dc:date.available":["2016-01-09T08:00:00Z"],"dc:description.abstract":["Bottlenose dolphins cooperate in a variety of contexts, including foraging,acquiring mates, playing, and assisting distressed conspecifics. To better understand the capacity for cooperative behaviors, animals are often given tasks that require pairs of animals to coordinate their actions in order to receive a reward. This paper reports the results of an aquatic version of one such task: cooperative rope-pulling. Three groups of captive bottlenose dolphins (Tursiops truncatus) were given an apparatus that could most easily be opened by the two animals working together. Two untrained adult males at one location were successful in opening the apparatus together, sharing the food and engaging in cooperative behaviors following their success. These results demonstrate that dolphins can solve a novel task via cooperation, but the failure of the other dolphins to do so suggests that personality, dominance, and social structure influence willingness to cooperate.
Doctoral Dissertation: http://aquila.usm.edu/dissertations/359/
"],"dc:identifier":["https://aquila.usm.edu/masters_theses/78"],"dc:subject":["dolphin","cooperation","problem solving","cognition","Tursiops Truncatus","Cognitive Psychology","Psychology","Social and Behavioral Sciences"],"dc:title":["Can Dolphins Cooperate to Solve a Novel Task?"],"thesis:degree_discipline":["Psychology"],"thesis:degree_level":["Masters Thesis"],"thesis:degree_name":["Master of Arts (MA)"]},"updated_at":"2026-07-24T05:44:27Z"}