How Do Wild Animals Know What to Eat?
Curiosity Weekly
Warner Bros. Discovery
4.6 • 963 Ratings
🗓️ 4 June 2021
⏱️ 13 minutes
🧾️ Download transcript
Summary
Learn why helping others feels like helping ourselves, how wild animals eat healthy, and how the Sahara feeds the Amazon.
We're less likely to remember the things we've given to friends than strangers by Kelsey Donk
- We’re Worse At Remembering Exactly What We’ve Given To Friends Than What We’ve Given To Strangers. (2021, April 12). Research Digest. https://digest.bps.org.uk/2021/04/12/were-worse-at-remembering-exactly-what-weve-given-to-friends-than-what-weve-given-to-strangers/
- Uğurlar, P., Posten, A.-C., & Zürn, M. (2021). Interpersonal closeness impairs decision memory. Social Psychology, 52(2), 125–129. https://doi.org/10.1027/1864-9335/a000439
How do wild animals eat a healthy diet when humans struggle to? by Ashley Hamer (Listener question from Jason in Port Ewen, New York)
- Predators hunt for a balanced diet. (2012). ScienceDaily. https://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2012/01/120110192942.htm
- Provenza, F. (2018, November 30). Animals Can Help Us Rediscover Our Nutritional Wisdom. Scientific American Blog Network. https://blogs.scientificamerican.com/observations/animals-can-help-us-rediscover-our-nutritional-wisdom/
- Strauss, S. (2006). Clara M. Davis and the wisdom of letting children choose their own diets. Canadian Medical Association Journal, 175(10), 1199–1199. https://doi.org/10.1503/cmaj.060990
- Schatzker, M. (2015, April 9). How Flavor Drives Nutrition. WSJ; The Wall Street Journal. https://www.wsj.com/articles/how-flavor-drives-nutrition-1428596326
- Tucker, A. (2009, July 14). Why Modern Foods Hijack Our Brains. Smithsonian Magazine; Smithsonian Magazine. https://www.smithsonianmag.com/arts-culture/why-modern-foods-hijack-our-brains-63123747/
- Deckersbach, T., Das, S. K., Urban, L. E., Salinardi, T., Batra, P., Rodman, A. M., Arulpragasam, A. R., Dougherty, D. D., & Roberts, S. B. (2014). Pilot randomized trial demonstrating reversal of obesity-related abnormalities in reward system responsivity to food cues with a behavioral intervention. Nutrition & Diabetes, 4(9), e129–e129. https://doi.org/10.1038/nutd.2014.26
The Amazon Rainforest feeds on millions of tons of dust from the Sahara Desert per year by Grant Currin
- Saharan Dust Feeds Amazon’s Plants. (2011). NASA. https://www.nasa.gov/content/goddard/nasa-satellite-reveals-how-much-saharan-dust-feeds-amazon-s-plants
- Yu, H., Chin, M., Yuan, T., Bian, H., Remer, L. A., Prospero, J. M., Omar, A., Winker, D., Yang, Y., Zhang, Y., Zhang, Z., & Zhao, C. (2015). The fertilizing role of African dust in the Amazon rainforest: A first multiyear assessment based on data from Cloud‐Aerosol Lidar and Infrared Pathfinder Satellite Observations. Geophysical Research Letters, 42(6), 1984–1991. https://doi.org/10.1002/2015gl063040
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Transcript
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| 0:00.0 | Hi, you're about to get smarter in just a few minutes with Curiosity Daily from |
| 0:04.8 | Curiosity.com. I'm Cody Gough. And I'm Ashley Hamer. Today you learn about why |
| 0:09.2 | we're less likely to remember things we've given to friends than strangers, and why the Amazon rainforest |
| 0:15.2 | feeds on millions of tons of dust from the Sahara Desert. |
| 0:19.2 | We'll also answer a listener question about how wild animals know how to eat a healthy diet. |
| 0:24.0 | Let's satisfy some curiosity. |
| 0:26.0 | When's the last time you helped a friend? |
| 0:29.0 | If you can't remember, that doesn't necessarily mean you're a bad friend. |
| 0:34.0 | New research suggests that we are less likely to remember the things we've given to friends than strangers. |
| 0:41.0 | And that forgetfulness actually says good things about our friendship. |
| 0:46.0 | This paper comes from researchers at the University of Cologne in Germany who find that the |
| 0:51.0 | closer we are to friends, |
| 0:52.8 | the worse our memory is for how much we've given them. |
| 0:55.8 | So we might end up doing more for our close friends |
| 0:59.2 | than we would for acquaintances. |
| 1:01.0 | And sure, that seems pretty intuitive, but the research suggests it's about more than just our love of our friends. |
| 1:08.0 | Our brains may actually blur the boundaries between ourselves and our BFFs. Helping them may feel more like helping ourselves. |
| 1:20.0 | For the studies, researchers had people play something called the trust game. |
| 1:25.0 | They gave people some amount of a theoretical resource, like pizza or Bitcoin, |
| 1:30.0 | and asked how much they would give to another hypothetical player. |
| 1:34.0 | The assumption was that the player would give some portion back to them later. |
| 1:39.0 | In the first study, people named the person they were closest to and played the trust game |
... |
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