Queen Mary, University of London Spacer image Spacer image
Nathan Emery

Dr Nathan Emery
Senior Lecturer, Royal Society Research Fellow

  • Room: 2.23, Fogg Building
  • Telephone: +44 (0)20 7882 3142
  • Email: n.j.emery("at" sign)qmul.ac.uk

Research interests:

My research focuses on animal intelligence and the evolution of cognition, particularly in corvids, parrots, monkeys and apes. Perhaps surprisingly, we have found striking similarities in the behaviour, ecology, neurobiology and cognitive mechanisms of corvids (crows, rooks, jackdaws and jays) and apes. We suggest that these similarities are adaptations for solving similar social and ecological problems, such as finding, protecting and extracting food and living in a complex social world. My research covers two main areas, social and physical cognition, such as what these birds may know about other minds and what they may know about the properties of objects. We use both a comparative approach, comparing different species of corvids, and corvids with apes, and an ecological/ethological approach, using information about the natural lives of these birds to design ecologically valid experiments. We currently have large colonies of rooks, jackdaws, Eurasian jays and western scrub-jays housed at the Sub-department of Animal Behaviour, University of Cambridge in large, modern aviaries with state-of-the-art facilities for behavioural observations and cognitive testing. Much of my corvid research is in collaboration with Professor Nicky Clayton, Department of Experimental Psychology, University of Cambridge, whilst work on the great apes is in collaboration with Dr Josep Call at the Max-Planck Institute for Evolutionary Anthropology, Leipzig, Germany.

Research group:

Publications:

  • Dally JM, Emery NJ & Clayton NS (2009). Avian theory of mind and counter espionage by food-caching western scrub-jays (Aphelocoma californica). European Journal of Developmental Psychology, in press.
  • Bird, CD & Emery, NJ. Rooks perceive physical support relations like 6-month old human babies. Proceedings of the Royal Society B, in press.
  • Helme, AE, Clayton, NS, & Emery, NJ. Physical enrichment for captive rooks (Corvus frugilegus). Proceedings of the Eighth International Conference on Environmental Enrichment, 5th-10th August 2007, Vienna, Austria. In press.
  • Kaminski, J & Emery, NJ. Comparative social cognition and theory of mind. In: Breed, M. & Moore, J (Eds.) Encyclopedia of Animal Behavior. Elsevier Press: Amsterdam.
  • von Bayern, AMP & Emery, NJ. (2009). Jackdaws are sensitive to human attentional and communicative gestures in different contexts. Current Biology, 19, 602-606.
  • Bird, CD & Emery, NJ. (2009). Insightful problem solving and creative tool modification by captive rooks. Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences USA, 106, 10370-10375.
  • Bird, CD & Emery, NJ. (2009). Reply to Lind et al.: Insight and learning. Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences USA, 106, E77.
  • Salwiczek, LH, Emery, NJ, Schlinger, B & Clayton, NS. (2009). Development of caching and object permanence in Western scrub-jays (Aphelocoma californica): Which emerges first? Journal of Comparative Psychology, 123, 295-303.
  • Bird, CD & Emery, NJ. (2009). Rooks use stones to raise the water level to reach a floating worm. Current Biology, 19, 1410-1414.
  • Stulp, G, Emery, NJ, Verhulst, S & Clayton, NS. (2009). Western scrub-jays conceal auditory information when competitors can hear but cannot see. Biology Letters, 5 583-585.
  • Emery, NJ & Clayton, NS (2009). Tool use and physical cognition in birds and mammals. Current Opinion in Neurobiology, 19, 27-33.
  • von Bayern, AMP & Emery, NJ (2009). Bonding, mentalising and rationality. In: Watanabe, S (Ed.) Irrational Humans, Rational Animals (pp. 287-303). Keio University Press: Tokyo.
  • Federspiel, IG, Clayton, NS & Emery, NJ. The 3E’s approach to social information use by birds. In: Dukas, R & Ratcliffe, JM (Eds.) Cognitive Ecology II. University of Chicago Press: Chicago. In press.
  • Seed AM, Call J, Emery NJ & Clayton NS. (2009). Chimpanzees solve the trap-problem when the confound of tool use is removed. Journal of Experimental Psychology: Animal Behavior Processes, 35, 23-34.
  • Seed AM, Emery NJ & Clayton NS (2009). Intelligence in corvids and apes: A case of convergent evolution? Ethology, 115, 401-420.
  • Emery, NJ & Clayton, NS. How to build a scrub-jay that reads minds. In: Itakura, S & Fujita, K (Eds.), Origins of the Social Mind: Evolutionary and developmental views (pp. 65-97). Springer Japan: Tokyo.
  • Clayton NS, Correia SPC, Raby CR, Alexis DM, Emery NJ & Dickinson A (2008). In defence of animal forethought. Animal Behaviour, 76, e9-11.
  • Dally, JM, Clayton, NS & Emery, NJ. (2008). Social influences on foraging by rooks (Corvus frugilegus). Behaviour, 145, 1101-1124.
  • Emery, NJ & Clayton, NS (2008). Imaginative scrub-jays, causal rooks and a liberal application of Occam’s aftershave. Commentary on Penn, Holyoak & Povinelli ‘Darwin’s mistake: Explaining the discontinuity between human and nonhuman minds’. Behavioural & Brain Sciences, 31, 134-135.
  • Emery, NJ & Clayton, NS (2009). Comparative social cognition. Annual Review of Psychology, 60, 87-113.
  • Bird, CD & Emery, NJ. (2008). Using video playbacks to investigate the social preferences of rooks (Corvus frugilegus). Animal Behaviour, 76, 679-687.
  • Clayton, NS & Emery, NJ. What do jays know about other times and other minds? In: Christian, Y & Berthod, A (Eds.) Neurobiology of the ‘Umwelt’: How living beings perceive the world (pp. 109-123). Springer-Verlag: Berlin. 
  • Clayton, NS & Emery, NJ (2008). Canny corvids and political primates: A case for convergent evolution in intelligence. In: Conway Morris, S (Ed.) The Deep Structure of Biology: Is convergence sufficiently ubiquitous to give a directional signal? (pp. 128-142). Templeton Foundation Press: West Conshohocken, PA. 
  • Emery, NJ & Clayton, NS. (2008). Commentary on Sayers & Lovejoy ‘The chimpanzee has no clothes: A critical examination of Pan troglodytes in models of human evolution’. Current Anthropology, 49, 100.
  • Seed, AM, Clayton, NS & Emery, NJ. (2008). Cooperative problem solving in rooks (Corvus frugilegus). Proceedings of the Royal Society of London B, 275, 1421-1429.
  • Machado, CJ, Emery, NJ, Capitanio, JP, Mason, WA, Mendoza, SP & Amaral, DG. (2008). Bilateral neurotoxic amygdala lesions in rhesus monkeys (Macaca mulatta): Consistent spectrum of behavior across different social contexts. Behavioral Neuroscience, 122, 251-266.
  • Alexis, D, Stevens, S, Emery, NJ & Clayton, NS. Feathered apes. La Recherche, 414:53-57.
  • Emery, NJ, Clayton, NS & Frith, CD (Eds., 2007). Social Intelligence: From brain to culture. Oxford University Press: Oxford. ISBN 978-0-19-921654-3.
  • Clayton, NS & Emery, NJ. (2007). The social life of corvids. Current Biology, 17, R652-R656.
  • von Bayern, AMP, de Kort, SR, Clayton, NS & Emery, NJ. (2007). Frequent food- and object-sharing during jackdaw (Corvus monedula) socialization. Behaviour, 144: 711-733.
  • Emery, NJ, Clayton, NS & Frith, CD. (2007). Introduction. Social intelligence: From brain to culture. Philosophical Transactions of the Royal Society of London B., 362: 485-488.
  • Clayton, NS, Dally, JM & Emery, NJ. (2007). Social cognition of food-caching corvids. Philosophical Transactions of the Royal Society of London B., 362: 507-522.
  • Emery, NJ, von Bayern, AMP, Seed, AM & Clayton, NS. (2007). Cognitive adaptations of social bonding in birds. Philosophical Transactions of the Royal Society of London B., 362: 489-505.
  • Emery, NJ, Clayton, NS & Frith, CD (Eds., 2007) Social intelligence: from brain to culture. Philosophical Transactions of the Royal Society of London B., 363 (1480): 485-754.
  • Seed, AM, Clayton, NS & Emery, NJ. (2007). Postconflict third-party affiliation in rooks (Corvus frugilegus). Current Biology, 17, 152-158.
  • Tebbich, S, Seed, AM, Emery, NJ & Clayton, NS. (2007) Non tool-using rooks (Corvus frugilegus) solve the trap tube task. Animal Cognition, 10, 225-231.
  • Dally, JM, Clayton, NS & Emery, NJ (2006). Social facilitation of novel food acceptance in rooks. Journal of Ornithology, 147, 154.
  • de Kort, SR, Tebbich, S, Dally, JM, Emery, NJ & Clayton, NS. (2006). The comparative cognition of caching. In: Wasserman, EA & Zentall, TR (Eds.), Comparative Cognition: Experimental explanations of animal intelligence (pp. 602-618). Oxford University Press: New York.
  • Clayton, NS, Emery, NJ & Dickinson, A. (2006). The rationality of animal memory: The cognition of caching. In: Nudds, M & Hurley, S (Eds.) Rational Animals? (pp. 197-216). Oxford University Press: Oxford.
  • Helme, AE, Call, J, Clayton, NS & Emery, NJ. (2006). What do bonobos (Pan paniscus) understand about physical contact? Journal of Comparative Psychology, 120, 294-302.
  • Helme, AE, Clayton, NS & Emery, NJ. (2006). What do rooks (Corvus frugilegus) understand about physical contact? Journal of Comparative Psychology, 120, 288-293.
  • de Kort, SR, Emery, NJ & Clayton, NS. (2006). Food sharing in jackdaws (Corvus monedula): With whom, why and what? Animal Behaviour, 72, 297-304.
  • Dally, JM, Clayton, NS & Emery, NJ. (2006). The behaviour and evolution of cache protection and pilferage. Animal Behaviour, 72, 13-23.
  • Dally, JM, Emery, NJ & Clayton, NS. (2006). Food-caching scrub-jays keep track of who was watching when. Science. 312, 1662-1665.
  • Seed, AM, Tebbich, S, Emery, NJ & Clayton, NS. (2006). Investigating physical cognition in rooks. Current Biology, 16, 697-701.
  • Clayton, NS, Emery, NJ & Dickinson, A. (2006). The prospective cognition of caching and recovery by western scrub-jays (Aphelocoma californica). Comparative Cognition and Behavior Reviews, 1, 1-11.
  • Emery, NJ (2006). Cognitive ornithology: The evolution of avian intelligence. Philosophical Transactions of the Royal Society: Biological Sciences, 361, 23-43.
  • Emery, NJ & Clayton, NS (2005). Theory of mind in scrub-jays: Mental attribution and experience projection. Neuroscience Research, 52S, S21.
  • Emery, NJ & Easton, A (2005). What is cognitive social neuroscience? In: Easton, A & Emery, NJ (Eds.), Cognitive Neuroscience of Social Behaviour. (pp. 1-16), Psychology Press.
  • Emery, NJ (2005). The evolution of social cognition. In: Easton, A & Emery, NJ. (Eds.), Cognitive Neuroscience of Social Behaviour. (pp. 115-156), Psychology Press.
  • Easton, A & Emery, NJ. (Eds., 2005) Cognitive Neuroscience of Social Behaviour. Psychology Press: Hove. ISBN 1-84169-349-9.
  • Emery, NJ & Clayton, NS. (2005). Evolution of avian brain and intelligence. Current Biology, 15, R946-R950.
  • Clayton, NS & Emery, NJ. (2005). Corvid cognition. Current Biology, 15, R80-R81.
  • Dally, JM, Emery, NJ & Clayton, NS. (2005). Cache protection strategies by western scrub-jays: Implications for social cognition. Animal Behaviour, 70, 1251-1263.
  • Dally, JM, Emery, NJ & Clayton, NS. (2005). The social suppression of caching by western scrub-jays (Aphelocoma californica). Behaviour, 142, 961-977.
  • Clayton, NS & Emery, NJ. (2004). Cache robbing. In: Bekoff, M (Ed.), Encyclopaedia of Animal Behavior. (pp. 251-252), Greenwood Publishing Group: Westport, CT.
  • Emery, NJ & Clayton, NS. (2004). Animal cognition. In: Bolhuis, J & Giraldeau, L-A (Eds.), The Behavior of Animals: Mechanisms, function & evolution (pp. 170-196), Blackwell Science Ltd.: Oxford. [Textbook].
  • Emery, NJ (2004). Are corvids ‘feathered apes’? Cognitive evolution in crows, jays, rooks and jackdaws. In: Watanabe, S (Ed.) Comparative Analysis of Minds (pp. 181-213), Keio University Press: Tokyo.
  • Emery, NJ & Clayton, NS. (2004). Comparing the complex cognitive abilities of birds and primates In: Rogers, L. J. & Kaplan, G (Eds.) Comparative Vertebrate Cognition: Are primates superior to non-primates? (pp. 3-55), Kluwer Academic/Plenum Publishers: New York.
  • Emery, NJ & Clayton, NS. (2004). The mentality of crows: Convergent evolution of intelligence in corvids and apes. Science, 306, 1903-1907.
  • Dally, JM, Emery, NJ & Clayton, NS. (2004). Cache protection strategies by western scrub-jays (Aphelocoma californica): hiding food in the shade. Proceedings of the Royal Society London: Biology Letters, 271, S387-S390.
  • Emery, NJ, Dally, J & Clayton, NS (2004). Western scrub-jays (Aphelocoma californica) use cognitive strategies to protect their caches from thieving conspecifics. Animal Cognition, 7, 37-43.
  • Clayton, NS, Bussey, TJ, Emery, NJ & Dickinson, A (2003). Prometheus to Proust: the case for behavioural criteria for ‘mental time travel’. Trends in Cognitive Sciences, 7, 436-437.
  • Emery, NJ (2003). A user’s guide to life. Science, 300, 585-586.
  • de Kort, SR, Emery, NJ & Clayton, NS (2003). Food offering in jackdaws Corvus monedula. Naturwissenschaften, 90, 238-240.
  • Emery, NJ & Clayton, NS (2001). Effects of experience and social context on prospective caching strategies in scrub jays. Nature, 414, 443-446.
  • Clayton, NS, Griffiths, DP, Emery, N.J. & Dickinson, A (2001) Elements of episodic-like memory in animals. Philosophical Transactions of the Royal Society of London: Biological Sciences, 356, 1483-1491. [Reprinted in Baddeley, A, Conway, M & Aggleton, JP (2002, Eds.), Episodic memory: New directions in research. (pp. 232-248), Oxford University Press: Oxford.]
  • Emery, NJ, Capitanio, JP, Mendoza, SP, Mason, WA, Machado, CJ & Amaral, DG (2001) The effects of bilateral lesions of the amygdala on dyadic social interactions in rhesus monkeys (Macaca mulatta). Behavioral Neuroscience, 15, 515-544.