A new study published in the Behavioural Ecology and Sociobiology journal suggests that shark social behavior is determined by an individual’s predisposition to be social or not. This underlines the idea that individual sharks have differing behavioural characters, or to put it more bluntly, have personalities. Whilst this will come as no surprise to those that have experienced them in the wild, it does help to overcome the preconception that sharks are not sentient.

The study was carried out on 100 small spotted cat sharks (Scyliorhinus canicula) in tanks containing different features and environments. The researchers plan to expand the study to sharks in the wild at the Bimini Biological Research Station in the Bahamas.