Universidades de Madrid

Prueba de Aptitud - Bachillerato LOGSE

Septiembre 2004
What´s it like to be a dog?

Do animals have rich emotional lives? For people who spend a lot of time with animals, these are
silly questions. Common sense tells us that our animal companions do indeed show happiness,
sadness, anger, jealousy and grief. However, common sense is sometimes difficult to reconcile
with science sense, which looks for repeatable observations under controlled conditions. But
emotions are often brief and unrepeatable.

For centuries, the inner lives of animals were ignored because we assumed animals were
automatons – biological machines ruled simply by urges and instincts, responding mechanically to
stimuli they were confronted with. However, we share nearly 99 percent of our genetic material
with our nearest biological relative, the chimpanzee. Is it possible, then, that with so much in
common, we have emotions and other creatures do not?

Like people, animals behave in recognizable ways when feeling happiness, grief or anger. In
addition, the study of neurobiology reveals that different species of animals have in common both
certain brain structures and the chemicals that transmit information within those structures. Today
many scientists are accepting that non-human animals do indeed experience emotions and there is
increasing evidence that birds, reptiles and fish experience some kind of emotional activity as well.
The study of animals emotions has become an exciting field that is quickly making up for lost time.
According to some scientists, in the last ten years we have probably learned as much as we did in
the previous one hundred.

1. READING COMPREHENSION (2 points) Are the following statements TRUE or FALSE?

Copy the evidence from the text. No marks are given for only TRUE or FALSE answers.

a) As far as animals emotions are concerned, common sense and science sense are always in
agreement.
b) Nowadays, an important part of the scientific community has come to the conclusion that non-
human animals do have feelings.

2. EXPRESSING THE MAIN IDEAS (2 points, 1 each correct answer) According to the text
and using your own words, answer the following questions:

a) Why did animal emotions go unnoticed for many years?

b) What scientific evidence is there to show that animals experience emotions?

3. Find the words in the text that mean (1 point):

a) truly (paragraph 1)
b) besides (paragraph 3)
c) growing (paragraph 3)
d) too (paragraph 3)
4. Complete the following sentences. Use the appropriate form of the word in brackets
when given. (2 points)

a) If scientists ________ (study) more about the characteristics of animal behaviour in the future,
they __________ (understand) more about human personality.
b) Two animals ______ show intense emotions are whales and dolphins. Their emotional lives
_______ (explore) for many years.
c) Scientists say that the most wonderful thing about _______ (work) with chimpanzees is
discovering their intelligence. In fact, they are________ (intelligent) animals in the world.
d) Rewrite the following sentence in reported speech with the words given: “My experiments
will prove the existence of the emotional lives of animals”, said Darwin.
Darwin said _________________________________________________________________

5. Write about 100 to 150 words on one of the following topics. (3 points)

A. Have you ever seen a film or read a book about an animal that showed its feelings? Explain.
B. Do you think animals really have emotional lives like humans? Discuss.
Answers

Question 1:

a) False. Common sense tells us that our animal companions do indeed show happiness,
sadness, anger, jealousy and grief. However, common sense is sometimes difficult to reconcile
with science sense.
b) True. Today many scientists are accepting that non-human animals do indeed experience
emotions.

Question 2:

a) For a long time, people thought that animals were like “robots” but with a biological structure.
They were considered to have just instincts which made them react to the context they were in.
b) Animals have a specific behaviour when they are happy, angry or sad. Moreover, we know that
some animals share several brain parts and brain chemicals.

Question 3:

a) indeed
b) in addition
c) increasing
d) as well

Question 4:

a) study / I´ll understand

b) which / have been explored
c) working / the most intelligent animals
d) Darwin said that his experiments would prove the existence of the emotional lives of animals.

Question 5:

This is a possible composition on option B.

Do you think animals really have emotional lives like humans? Discuss.

It is not an easy matter to prove that animals really have feelings, as scientists know. However, for
many people it is obvious that animals are not machines without emotions but they have many
feelings humans have.

For example, anyone who has a dog or a cat at home will agree that their pets do not feel the
same way every day. Sometimes, pets seem happier than usual or sadder. For that reason,
nowadays there are even vets specialised in animal psychology. Everyone knows that there are
dogs that seem deeply depressed when their owner dies or is away from them for a long time. Is
that a coincidence? or do animals really have the ability to feel emotions? Considering those
cases, in my opinion, nobody can answer “no” to the second question.

In conclusion, it may be hard to analyse animals´ emotions in a scientific way, but there is enough
evidence from everyday life to make us believe that animals do have their own feelings.