Goats’ Responses in Relation to Humans

Abstract

Both humans and boer goats (Capra aegagrus hircus) process physical cues using the neurons plasticised by the FMR1 gene (Bretherick et al, 2020). The purpose of this study was to document the behavior of goats and humans after receiving physical cues in order to make a decision that would result in a reward, indicating the use of FMR1 as a homologous gene in both species.

Both female Boer goats from a small farm in Michigan and college-aged female humans were subjected to trials with randomized baited bowls that were referred to by the cues of looking at, touching, pointing, and a negative control of no cue at all. When the baited bowl was chosen, the food under the bowl was given to the subject. It was hypothesized that the physical cues of pointing and touching would be more successful in cueing the subjects when compared to the cues involving the head that are more ambiguous (Nawroth et al, 2014) . The significance in the science of this study is that the documentation of the FMR1 gene’s function helps to further the understanding of the learning disabilities and autism that affect many people around the world. The predictions of this study would be two-fold: Cues involving hands will be more successful in leading the subject to choose the baited bowl; and that the human subjects would be more successful in choosing the baited bowl overall when compared to the performance of the goat subjects (Nawroth et al, 2014)