the result were truly remarkable. the 30 test octopuses exposed only to octopuses demonstrating a preference for red balls mostly chose red balls themselves ( focus fig. 12.3b ) even though they received no reward or punishment for choosing one ball over the other. similarly , test octopuses exposed only to octopuses demonstrating a preference for white balls mostly chose white balls themselves ( focus fig. 12.3d ) . moreover, the preferences shown by observer octopuses persisted when the animals were tested again 5 days later. these results are all the more impressive in that the octopuses showed a clear preference for red balls for some reason; so choosing a white ball over a red ball went against their apparent preference for red.