I was invited to write an outlook article, i.e. a new format that discusses ground-breaking developments in the field of Animal Behaviour and Cognition, for the journal Learning & Behavior. I wrote about an exciting new study by Havlik et al. that reveals that rats are less likely to help a conspecific in need in the presence of passive bystanders but that they are more likely to help when there are active bystanders that engage in helping, too. Thereby their study highlights the social skills of rats and the role of bystanders on cooperation, raising a range of interesting questions that should be explored both theoretically and empirically.

Schweinfurth, M.K. (2021) Anybody watching? How others affect helpful actions. Learning and Behavior 49: 5-6. (published online: 03 September 2020)