One study found that rats emitted ultrasonic vocalizations when they were subjected to manual somatosensory stimulation, i.e., tickling. The results of this controversial research were published in ...

David Stipp’s “Why Rats Laugh & Jellyfish Sleep” is a breezy ode to nature’s long game. The respected science expert’s beautifully written book celebrates the adaptive ingenuity of animals whose ...

When the cat’s away, to paraphrase an old cliché, the rats will play. Neuroscientist Jaak Panksepp, working at Washington State University, has devoted a decade to watching that play. And from those ...

Laughter is often called the most human sound. It carries joy, relief, connection, and sometimes even healing. For centuries, we believed that laughter belonged only to us, a special emotional ...

If you think laughter and comedy are reserved strictly for humans, you’d be wrong. A study in the late 1990s showed that creatures like rats emit ultrasonic vocalizations while playing with or ...