Cold-blooded cognition: Recent advances in reptile cognition and their implications

The field of animal cognition has traditionally focused on mammalian and avian species. However, to gain a comprehensive understanding of the evolution of cognition it is imperative that we investigate comparable questions across a range of taxa. In this context reptiles are particularly interesting since they represent a key amniotic Class and are thus important for understanding how cognition has evolved in this clade. In this review we will summarize recent advances in the field of reptile cognition and then go on to highlight key future areas for research, focusing on both fundamental questions in cognitive science and the application of cognition to current challenges, including welfare and conservation.