The mirror self-recognition test is one experiment that has fascinated me. The test is used to determine when humans, as well as animals, become self-aware of themselves. The investigation involves putting children of age between 5-24 months in front of a mirror for sometimes. After that, the parent moves the kid away from the mirror and pretend to wipe their face. In the process, a mark is placed just below their cheek and put back in front of the mirror. From the experiment have learned that self-consciousness is realized from the age of 18 months. The child of age 17months and below would overlook the marked place in the cheek. However, the child above 18months would notice the mark and try removing it.
Mirror self-recognition in the bottlenose dolphin: A case of cognitive convergence by Reiss and Marino. The study focused on establishing whether a dolphin would use or not use reflective surfaces to view themselves after being marked or not marked. The experiment involved two dolphins. The main dolphin for the study was a 13-year old male bottlenose dolphin, cohabit with a 17-year old male bottlenose dolphin as next subject. The test was conducted in two phases. Phase 1 involved one subject being marked in a pool with reflective surfaces (Reiss & Marino, 2001). Step 2 involved the subjects put in a pool with non-reflective walls.
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The experiment observed that the two dolphins used the mirrors to check their body parts for markings. It, therefore, concluded that bottlenose dolphins a non-primitive species is capable of mirror self-recognition. It noted that bottlenose dolphins have several behavioral and social-ecological characteristics in common to both apes and humans.
Reference
Reiss, D., & Marino, L. (2001). Mirror self-recognition in the bottlenose dolphin: A case of cognitive convergence. Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences , 98 (10), 5937-5942. https://doi.org/10.1073/pnas.101086398
