The smell of cooperation

Research team with the University of Göttingen finds effect of odour on helpfulness in rats. Despite their reputation, rats are surprisingly sociable and actually regularly help each other out with tasks. Researchers at the Universities of Göttingen, Bern and St Andrews have now shown that a rat just has to smell the scent of another rat that is engaged in helpful behaviour to increase his or her own helpfulness. This is the first study to show that just the smell of a cooperating individual rat is enough to trigger an altruistic and helpful response in another. The research was published in the Proceedings of the Royal Society B. It is well known that rats will help each other out. What the researchers wanted to know was whether the rat's odour during this behaviour had any effect on another rat's helpfulness. They therefore carried out a series of tests to study the importance of the scent of a rat while making cooperative decisions.