Allison B. Kaufman is a research scientist for the Department of Ecology and Evolutionary Biology at University of Connecticut, USA, and holds a Ph.D. in Neuroscience from the University of California at Riverside. She currently has a research program based at the University of Connecticut, where her main interests are in communication and innovative abilities in animals. She has written or edited five books, including The Psych 101 series and Animal Cognition 101 with Erin Colbert-White.