Do Dolphins And Whales Experience Pleasure?

 Humans train animals by rewarding them with tasty treats and trainers couple the reward with a sound, such as a buzz or a whistle. Once the animal has mastered the task, the trainer stops dispensing food, relying instead on the whistle or buzzer to inform the animal that it has performed successfully and that it will be rewarded - with food, but later. Even though there may be no food reward at the time, whales and dolphins still squeal in response to the sound substituted for the food reward. And Sam Ridgway found that when he trained dolphins and beluga whales to switch off a sound after diving hundreds of meters, the animals produced the same squeals of victory when the sound stopped.   read more

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