Evolution of Cognition

Catalog description

Prerequisites: BIOL 3102 or consent of instructor; BIOL 3302 and PSYCH 2211 are strongly recommended. The evolutionary ecology of animal cognitive abilities. Topics include learning, memory, perception, navigation, and communication from an evolutionary perspective. The focus is on cognitive abilities as adaptations, which have evolved to solve specific environmental problems. Topics include empirical methods for assessing cognitive ability, experimental design, theoretical approaches for generating predictions, and the parsimonious interpretation of data. Two hours of lecture and one hour of discussion per week.