Your Houseplants Can Think, Talk, Read Your Mind: New Research Adds Evidence

New research by a team of scientists at the University of Western Australia (UWA) shows plants have long-term memory. This adds to a body of research that has shown plants have high-level mental processes, including the ability to feel fear and happiness, the ability to communicate, and even the ability to read your mind.

Here’s a look into the minds of plants.

1. Plants Have Long-Term Memory: New Research

Dr. Monica Gagliano led the UWA study, which was published in the journal Oecologia.

She and her team dropped potted Mimosa pudica plants onto cushioning foam from a height that would shock the plants, but not harm them. Mimosas were chosen for a unique attribute: they close their leaves when threatened, thus it is easy to observe their reaction to stimuli.

What the researchers wanted to see is whether the plants were able to learn that the shock wouldn’t hurt them. They also wanted to see if the plants could remember that fact over an extended period of time.

The plants stopped reacting after a few drops, showing they had learned the action was not dangerous. The researchers made sure it wasn’t simply that the plants were fatigued and could no longer react; they applied a different stimulus to which the plants instantly reacted.

The tests were carried out on multiple plants over various time periods.

Some plants were left undisturbed for 28 days after an initial test of a few drops. After so many days, the plants still remembered the lesson they had learned and did not react to the drop, though they did react to other stimuli.

How Do Plants Think Without Brains?

Though plants do not have the brains and neural systems observed in other organisms with higher mental faculties, researchers are starting to hypothesize alternative systems. For example, the Economist explains, plants have well-formed pathways through which they may transmit information in the form of electrical signals.

2. Plants Have Feelings

Cleve Backster started his experiments with the plant Dracaena. (Courtesy of Cleve Backster)

The late Cleve Backster made an astonishing discovery in 1966 that started the trend of people talking to their houseplants.

Backster was a former CIA lie-detector specialist who developed polygraph techniques still in general use today by the U.S. military and government agencies. He performed an experiment on dragon pot plants detailed in his book “The Secret Life of Plants.”

He got two Dracaena plants and connected one of them to a lie detector. He had a person stomp the other plant. When this action was performed, the polygraph showed the plant that witnessed the stomping registered fear.

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