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by Scottie Westfall

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How intelligent are opossums?

October 26, 2012 by SWestfall3

There’s a common statement on various websites related to opossums. It goes something like this:

“Opossums are not as stupid as people think. A study (or studies or tests) show that opossums are better at learning and discrimination showed them to be higher ranked than dogs.”

Okay. I’m going to call bullshit on this one.

Wanna know why?

I can’t find the study or test or any kind of peer-reviewed paper that says this.

And if I were a researcher making comparisons between the cognitive abilities of certain animals and the opossum wound up besting the dog, then I’d have very real questions about my methodology.

Here are the reason for my skepticism:

First of all, opossums have very small, very primitive brains. They are primitive mammals that retain much of the basal mammalian body type. They look very similar to basal placental mammals like the Cuban solenodon. Primitive mammals are unlikely to have many of the sophisticated cognitive abilities of more derived species, especially those that evolved to hunt cooperatively, like wolves and domestic dogs.

Secondly, no ethologist has recognized any sophisticated behavior in opossums. Opossums have been commonly kept as pets and as research animals for a very long time. They have been studied very closely, but no one is writing any great pieces of research on how opossums are able to reach such cognitive heights with such primitive little brains.

Now, there are many, many researchers looking into the cognitive abilities of dogs.  Studies have shown that dogs have very sophisticated social cognition, which they may have evolved through domestication. Dogs recognize the importance of human gestures, and they also know that when a person closes his or her eyes, the person cannot sense what the dog is doing.  There are dogs that respond to hundreds of words, and dogs can think abstractly.

If it were suddenly discovered that opossums could best dogs at these skills, it would be shatter almost everything we know about cognition in vertebrates. It would also fundamentally shift how we understand brain physiology, for an opossum’s brain is far more primitive and less complex than that of a dog.

So here’s my question to every site and book I’ve seen that makes this claim:

Where is the study that shows the impressive learning and discrimination abilities of opossums?

What’s its citation?

My guess is this study either doesn’t exist, or it is a simple methodology error in a multi-species comparative cognition study that the authors attempt to account for in the work.

And one study does not change the entire body of knowledge about a subject. It’s only when a particular study has a superior methodology that one can say it is paradigm shifting.

If this study does exist, it didn’t change the scientific community’s understanding of opossum versus dog intelligence.

If it did, you’d be seeing researchers working with large numbers of opossums to see how their cognitive abilities work.

And that’s simply not the case.

The old saw that states that extraordinary claims require extraordinary evidence certainly applies here.

And as far as I can tell, this is nothing more than an internet rumor that somehow grew legs.

 

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Posted in animal behavior, wildlife | Tagged opossum, opossum intelligence, Virginia opossum | 7 Comments

7 Responses

  1. on October 26, 2012 at 1:31 pm Anna

    If they were smart, they would quit coming into the dog yard & playing dead. My Chow/Siberian is perfectly happy to oblige them by making them actually dead. She isn’t fooled by their “playing possum” even for a second.


  2. on October 26, 2012 at 1:33 pm massugu

    Couldn’t agree more. Intelligent possums–it is to laugh.


  3. on October 26, 2012 at 2:22 pm Jessica

    I’ve worked in wildlife rehab, and I can tell you anecdotally that opossums are dumb as crap.

    They are cute as babies (and hideous as adults).

    Sometimes I think people equate cuteness with intelligence. That might actually be the source of this misinformation.


  4. on October 26, 2012 at 3:05 pm David Cunningham

    I’ve raised many raccoons and opossum from infancy until they were old enough to care for themselves, and while the coons rivaled my dogs for intelligence, the opossums were about as bright as my chickens; maybe a little dumber. They also didn’t have much in the way of what I considered “personalities”.
    But I know some people who are wildlife rehabilitators in Florida, and they love opossum and think they are the brightest things.


    • on October 26, 2012 at 5:25 pm retrieverman

      When you look a raccoon in the eye, you can tell there’s something there. It’s exactly the same essence you get when you look into a dog’s eyes.

      I wish we had domesticated raccoons. It would be awesome to have dog with hands!


      • on October 26, 2012 at 7:24 pm David Cunningham

        The main problem with raccoons as pets is that they are so curious, and powerful for their size. I have had a 20 pound coon decide it wanted something behind the refrigerator and try to squeeze behind it and actually shove the appliance away from the wall. And those security latches made to keep toddlers out of cupboards are no match for a coon. I’m glad my dogs don’t have hands; they’d be getting their own biscuits out of the cupboard.


      • on October 27, 2012 at 5:22 pm megrim43

        Dogs with hands! OMG! My lot with hands would be unstoppable!There would be a local crime wave! Just be careful what you wish for…..

        Elizabeth



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