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Amaze Lab
  • 10/7/2024
Dolphins are highly intelligent creatures, delighting humans with their expressive faces that often appear to be smiling. Well, a new study looking at that very grin has discovered that it may in fact be a smile, one that is infectious.

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Learning
Transcript
00:00Dolphins are highly intelligent creatures, delighting humans with their expressive faces
00:07that often appear to be smiling.
00:09Well, a new study looking at that very grin has discovered that it may in fact be a smile,
00:14one that is infectious.
00:16The study looked specifically at bottlenose dolphins that are currently in captivity and
00:19observed them during what researchers describe as play fighting.
00:23When a dolphin initiates the activity, researchers say it relaxes its mouth in a smile-like fashion.
00:28If the other dolphin then returns the smile, the two initiate play fighting, something
00:32which may otherwise look like aggressive behavior.
00:35While this is a really neat aspect of dolphin interactions, experts say it could have much
00:38wider implications for the entire mammalia class.
00:41The relaxed open mouth before play has been observed in several other mammal species as
00:45well, with the researchers saying this could be something ingrained in our DNA.
00:49With evolutionary biologist Elisabeth de Pelagis saying about it, the relaxed open mouth seen
00:54in social carnivores, monkeys' play faces, and even human laughter is a universal sign
00:59of playfulness, helping animals and us signal fun and avoid conflict.

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