Between 2014 and 2017, researchers from the University of Turku in Finland studied 257 semi-captive elephants who work logging timber in Myanmar (meaning their study was focused only on Asian, rather than African, elephants.) They asked the mahout, or elephant rider, of each elephant to fill out a survey assessing their elephants’ behavior on 28 metrics. These included traits like affection (shown by an elephant rubbing its forehead or body against another elephant), confidence (for example, making decisions without hesitation), inventiveness, (e.g. an elephant that creates new tools), mischievousness (such as swinging a trunk to spray mucus), and slowness (moving in a relaxed, deliberate manner.) Each elephant was rated on a four-point scale of how often they displayed such behavior, from “very rarely,” to “most of the time.” [...]
Within these 28 ratings, the researchers identified 15 behaviors that could be grouped into three traits and correlated with each other. Each of these three broader traits was named by one of its indicative behaviors. “Attentiveness” was defined according to attentive, obedient, slow, vigilant, confident, and active behavior—Seltman describes it as “how an elephant acts in and perceives its environment. “Aggressiveness” describes aggressive, dominant, and moody behavior. And “sociability” is made up of mischievousness, social behavior towards elephants of the same sex, playfulness, friendliness towards elephants of the same sex and people, popularity, and affectionate behavior. “Sociability describes how an elephant seeks closeness to other elephants and humans, and how popular they are as social partners,” said Seltmann. [...]
Elephants are not the only animals with distinct personalities. Crayfish can be anxious, trout can be shy, and some baboons are more friendly than others. Humans do have a tendency to anthropomorphize animals and read emotions into individual actions but studies into patterns of animal behavior show that it’s not just our imagination: Many animals really do have distinct personalities.
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