Updated

University of Tübingen researchers found that two carrion crows judged the direction of moving dots in an average of 235 milliseconds, twice as fast as humans and monkeys. The study, published in the journal Science, used a touchscreen test in which the crows indicated whether most dots moved left or right by pecking a matching target. The birds stayed highly accurate, and with clear signals nearly 100 percent correct, adding to evidence of crow intelligence. Philipp Schmidbauer and Professor Andreas Nieder recorded neurons in the nidopallium caudolaterale, a region the article compares to the human prefrontal cortex. Distinct activity for the two directions appeared just 70 milliseconds after the dots appeared, and activity rose toward a decision threshold before the birds responded. Nieder said the neural dynamics are consistent with established models of decision-making in humans and non-human primates, even though bird brains lack a layered cerebral cortex. The researchers suggest the speed may reflect the demands of flight and foraging, but the exact biological mechanisms remain unknown.