Spring 2027

Animal Cognition

Animal Cognition compares human and non-human cognition to explore psychological uniqueness, evolutionary origins, and fundamental cognitive processes.

no offering record for this termCredits unavailable
Recorded instructors · Spring 2027 No instructors listed

Summary

1 / 8

Past student reviews · Stephen Ferrigno

The course had a strict attendance policy where one absence could impact grades, and grading criteria were sometimes described as confusing.

What you’ll be able to do

  • Describe and and discuss the fundamentals of cognitive science through the lens of comparative cognition

  • Analyze the evolutionary process and how human and animal minds are the product of it

  • Analyze methods of experimentation in animal cognition and cognitive science

  • Read and interpret data from graphs

  • Critically evaluate primary research articles, secondary news articles about science, and observations of animal cognition and "intelligence"

Source: UW Guide

Grade history

↗
average GPA
letter grades
A
AB
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All recorded terms · compare terms & instructors

Prerequisites

Course map

PSYCH 406, 414, 449, 450, 454, 460, 462, or 464

PSYCH 515

This is a best-effort interpretation; check the catalog requirements above.

Prerequisite text tree

Professors

Spring 2027

No instructors recorded for this selection.

Historical instructors & teaching patterns

STEPHEN FERRIGNO is recorded teaching in Fall 2025. Recorded history may be incomplete and does not establish a future schedule.

Recorded history may be incomplete and does not establish a future schedule.

Calendar & sections

Spring 2027

Schedule loads here as you scroll.

SectionModeEnrolled / capacityWaitlist

Times are Central. Select a meeting for details; export includes recorded dates for the selected sections.

Meeting source records
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Student experience

the class

Past student reviews · Stephen Ferrigno

Students found the content easy and the lecture pace slow, noting that attending lectures and paying attention often led to good grades.

Recent recorded grades — Fall 2025: 3.37 GPA, 64.1% A/AB (n=78 letter grades).

difficulty & workload

Past student reviews · Stephen Ferrigno

The course had a strict attendance policy where one absence could impact grades, and grading criteria were sometimes described as confusing.

Past student reviews · Stephen Ferrigno

One student appreciated the fun videos shown in class, though they noted the instructor often ran over time during quizzes.

Topics

  • Comparative cognition, human psychological uniqueness, and evolutionary origins
  • Methods of experimentation in animal cognition and cognitive science

Skills

  • Describing and discussing cognitive science fundamentals via comparative cognition
  • Analyzing evolutionary processes shaping human and animal minds
  • Analyzing experimental methods in animal cognition and cognitive science
  • Reading and interpreting data from graphs

Grades

Latest available · Fall 2025— not enough history to project Spring 2027.

average GPA
A / AB grades
letter grades
Instructor

Grade distribution · % of letter grades

A
AB
B
BC
C
D
F
More grade details Grade mix, volume & source data

Where this course fits relative to

Latest available grades · Fall 2025 · all course levels

GPA

Higher than % of other courses in this group.

Course GPAs · red marks this course’s range

letter grades

More recorded grades than % of other courses in this group.

Typical course in this group: letter grades.

About this comparison

1316 courses over the same term, each with at least 30 recorded letter grades. Cross-listed courses count once. GPA is not a measure of difficulty or teaching quality. The typical course is the median by recorded grade count; tied values are not counted as lower. Grade counts describe course scale, not unique students or typical section size.

Descriptions compare GPA with this group’s average: at least 0.20 higher or lower; otherwise close to average. Section size uses median recorded enrollment: small up to 30, mid-sized 31–99, large 100+. Lectures and discussion/lab sections are described separately.

Sources & history

UW–Madison

Catalog & offerings

Descriptions, prerequisites, and recorded course offerings.

Catalog observation history

Observations at scan time; dates do not imply when a catalog change took effect.

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Selected offering source records

No offering records for the selected term.

Raw records 
[]
Rate My Professors

Student reviews

Original comments behind the course and instructor summaries.

Read original reviews
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Madgrades

Grade history

Recorded grade distributions by term, section, and instructor.

Explore recorded grades
Dataset & model

Recorded 2026-10-14

View the dataset on Hugging Face
Model outputs & technical records
Qwen/Qwen3.8-27B
LLM outputs across runs
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Full model traces

Recorded model configuration, reasoning, and tool conversations.

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Model & dataset provenance 
{
  "model": "Qwen/Qwen3.8-27B",
  "model_revision": "1d4bf0f2ff6012fd82039f2fa52739d0dd7c60c0",
  "task_version": "17",
  "output_id": "933975d955730d289016bc69825ad6fe40d908f4b8172c4bd2d1e4008ffc96c2",
  "requirements_status": "valid",
  "dataset_revision": "fc1811fa52e581ea57a35c0cf3343f8740a8ffbf",
  "observed_at": "2026-10-14 17:50:09.728220+00:00"
}