Scroll through social media, and you’re sure to find videos of cockatoos swaying rhythmically to music. Scientists studying these impressive dance moves report in a recent study that at least 10 cockatoo species dance, sharing at least 30 distinct dance moves between them.
Cockatoos are a family of parrots, which are highly intelligent birds. Many parrot species are known to be masters of vocal mimicry. Pet cockatoos, in particular, are quite popular online for their dance moves: Snowball, a male Eleonora cockatoo (Cacatua galerita eleonora), is famous for bobbing his head and tapping his feet to the Backstreet Boys song “Everybody.” Researchers who analyzed his dance found he had at least 14 different dance moves.
To see how widespread dancing is among cockatoos, scientists in the latest study analyzed 45 cockatoo-dancing videos available on YouTube, Facebook, TikTok and Instagram.
Of the 21 known cockatoo species worldwide, the scientists found dancing videos featuring 10 species, including white (C. alba), Goffin’s (C. goffiniana), sulfur-crested (C. galerita) and Moluccan cockatoos (C. moluccensis), as well as little corellas (C. sanguinea) and galahs (Eolophus roseicapilla).
Across all the species, the researchers recorded 30 distinct dance movements, including 17 that hadn’t been previously described scientifically. They also recorded 17 “rare” movements only seen in one bird.
The analysis “indicated that dancing is far more complex and varied than previously thought,” lead author Natasha Lubke from Charles Sturt University in Australia said in a statement.
The researchers also tested if cockatoos only dance in response to music. At Wagga Wagga Zoo in New South Wales, Australia, they subjected two galahs, two sulfur-crested and two pink cockatoos (Lophochroa leadbeateri) to three different treatments: electronic dance music on repeat for 20 minutes; no music for the same duration; and a podcast episode with people talking.
All birds showed some dance movements during all three treatments, without responding to music in any special way.
“We don’t fully know why this is,” Rafael Freire, study co-author from Charles Sturt University, writes in The Conversation. “One possibility could be because we played music to existing male-female pairs, and the social environment alone was sufficient to trigger dance behaviour.”
Freire adds that since dancing has mainly been observed in pet cockatoos, the “dance moves might represent an adaptation of courtship display movements as a way to connect with their human owners.”
Playing music may even help enrich the lives of captive parrots, Freire said in the statement.
“The similarities with human dancing make it hard to argue against well-developed cognitive and emotional processes in parrots, and playing music to parrots may improve their welfare,” he said. “Further research would be beneficial to determine if music can trigger dance in captive birds and serve as a form of environmental enrichment.”
Banner image: Sulfur-crested cockatoos. Image by Sardaka via Wikimedia Commons (CC BY-SA 4.0).
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