Do Insects Recognize Humans?

Insects may have tiny brains, but they can perform some seriously impressive feats of mental gymnastics. According to a growing number of studies, some insects can count, categorize objects, even recognize human faces — all with brains the size of pinheads.

Do insects remember you?

They put features together to recognise a specific human face. We now know that insects' small brains can reliably recognise at least a limited number of faces. This suggests that in humans, the advantage of our big brain may be the very large number of individuals we can remember.

Can insects feel affection?

Bumblebees seem to have a “positive emotionlike state,” according to a study published this week in Science. In other words, they may experience something akin to happiness. To some, the idea is still controversial, however. Unlike humans, you can't simply ask a bee to interrogate its own emotions and describe them.