German scientists from the Max Planck Institute for Evolutionary Biology and the University of Potsdam conducted experiments with mice and found that urban ones are smarter and rural ones are more persistent.
Urban rodents are better at “puzzles,” while rural ones are more persistent.
For the study, they caught 14 mice in Berlin and 17 in villages. To get to the food, the animals had to go through a complex maze.
In the first part of the experiment, the dainty was placed in a house made of construction material. In the second – the reward was waiting for animals in a plastic box behind the metal door of the cage. As a result, 77 percent of urban mice and only 52 percent of rural.
Researchers noted that rodents from metropolitan areas lost interest in the puzzle much faster if they could not solve it immediately. And the rural ones showed much more persistence, although their methods were not always effective.
Researchers concluded that living next to humans has greatly changed the behavior of urban mice.
They adapted to a more complex and diverse environment. At the same time, there is more food in the metropolis than in the countryside, so urban mice are much less persistent.
