 Kenta Suzuki

Kenta Suzuki is a researcher in animal behaviour whose work includes experimental comparisons of domestication and wild songbirds. A 2021 study led by Kenta Suzuki compared neophobia, reluctance to approach unfamiliar objects, in the Bengalese finch and its wild ancestor, the white-rumped munia. The experiment measured feeding in the presence of a novel object rather than assigning a general personality label to the birds.^[ref]

More Bengalese finches ate under the novel-object conditions, and their delay before feeding was shorter and less affected by the object. The comparison supplies a concrete behavioral outcome through which to investigate domestication. It also illustrates the value of defining the response operationally: willingness to feed beside a new object measures a particular context, rather than every possible response to danger or unfamiliarity.^[ref]