Reading animal behaviour without assigning unsupported human motives

The short answer

Say what the animal did before you say why it did it. “The bird flattened its feathers and moved behind the branch” is an observation. “The bird was scared” is an interpretation. It might be right, but it needs evidence. Keeping the two apart makes you a better observer and makes wildlife narration easier to judge.

Why this matters

Narration often gives animals human motives: jealousy, revenge, embarrassment, pride. Some animals do have rich inner lives, and scientists study emotion in animals seriously. But a motive stated as fact can hide what the footage actually shows, and it can be simply wrong.

A worked example: the “guilty look”

Many dog owners describe a “guilty look” after a dog has done something forbidden. In a 2009 study, Alexandra Horowitz filmed 14 dogs in trials where they either did or did not eat a forbidden treat, and where owners either did or did not scold them. The behaviours owners call “guilty” were not linked to whether the dog had eaten the treat. They were more frequent when owners scolded. The study concluded the look is better described as a response to the owner’s cues than as evidence that the dog understood a misdeed. A later study by Ostojić and colleagues, with a different design, also found dogs’ greeting behaviour was not affected by whether they had misbehaved.

This does not prove dogs feel nothing. It shows that a familiar human reading of a behaviour can fall apart when tested.

Four questions to ask

In 1963 the ethologist Niko Tinbergen proposed that any behaviour can be explained in four complementary ways. Bateson and Laland’s 2013 review describes how the framework is still used today. In plain terms:

1. Mechanism. What triggered it right now? A sound, a smell, light, hunger, another animal?
2. Development. How did this individual come to behave this way? Was it learned, practised, or present from birth?
3. Function. How might this behaviour help the animal survive or reproduce?
4. Evolution. How did the behaviour arise across the history of the species and its relatives?

A good explanation usually answers more than one question, and none of them needs a human-style motive.

A field method

1. Describe the posture, movement and sound in neutral words. Ears back, tail low, wings spread, repeated call.
2. Note the context. What happened just before? Who else was present? Time of day, weather, season.
3. List at least two explanations. A bird “dancing” may be courting, threatening a rival or flushing insects.
4. Look for what would tell them apart. Does it happen only near a mate? Only when food is present?
5. Hold your conclusion lightly. Write “probably” and “may” until you have seen the behaviour repeated in comparable situations.

Words to watch for in narration

Using this guide with the catalogue

Our editorial notes try to describe first and interpret second. If you think a note goes beyond what the footage shows, please tell us through the contact page.