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Marten, K., & Psarakos, S. (1995). Using self-view television to distinguish between self-examination and social behavior in the bottlenose dolphin (Tursiops truncatus). Conscious Cogn, 4(2), 205–224.
Abstract: In mirror mark tests dolphins twist, posture, and engage in open-mouth and head movements, often repetitive. Because postures and an open mouth are also dolphin social behaviors, we used self-view television as a manipulatable mirror to distinguish between self-examination and social behavior. Two dolphins were exposed to alternating real-time self-view (“mirror mode”) and playback of the same to determine if they distinguished between them. The adult male engaged in elaborate open-mouth behaviors in mirror mode, but usually just watched when played back the same material. Mirror mode behavior was also compared to interacting with real dolphins (controls). Mark tests were conducted, as well as switches from front to side self-views to see if the dolphins turned. They presented marked areas to the self-view television and turned. The results suggest self-examination over social behavior.
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Drapier, M., Chauvin, C., & Thierry, B. (2002). Tonkean macaques ( Macaca tonkeana) find food sources from cues conveyed by group-mates. Anim. Cogn., 5(3), 159–165.
Abstract: It is possible that non-specialised cues transmitted by conspecifics guide animals' food search provided they have the cognitive abilities needed to read these cues. Macaques often check the mouth of their group-mates by olfactory and/or visual inspection. We investigated whether Tonkean macaques ( Macaca tonkeana) can find the location of distant food on the basis of cues conveyed by group-mates. The subjects of the study were two 6-year-old males, who belonged to a social group of Tonkean macaques raised in semi-free-ranging conditions. In a first experiment, we tested whether the subject can choose between two sites after having sniffed a partner who has just eaten food corresponding to one of the sites. We found that both subjects were able to choose the matching site significantly above the chance level. This demonstrated that Tonkean macaques are capable of delayed olfactory matching. They could associate a food location with an odour conveyed by a partner. In a second experiment, the same subjects were allowed to see their partner through a Plexiglas window. Both subjects were still able to choose the matching site, demonstrating they could rely on visual cues alone. Passive recruitment of partners appears possible in macaques. They can improve their foraging performances by finding the location of environmental resources from olfactory or visual cues conveyed by group-mates.
Keywords: *Animal Communication; Animals; *Cognition; *Feeding Behavior; Food; *Macaca; Male; Smell; *Social Behavior; Visual Perception
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Anderson, J. R. (1995). Self-recognition in dolphins: credible cetaceans; compromised criteria, controls, and conclusions. Conscious Cogn, 4(2), 239–243.
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Herrmann, E., Melis, A. P., & Tomasello, M. (2006). Apes' use of iconic cues in the object-choice task. Anim. Cogn., 9(2), 118–130.
Abstract: In previous studies great apes have shown little ability to locate hidden food using a physical marker placed by a human directly on the target location. In this study, we hypothesized that the perceptual similarity between an iconic cue and the hidden reward (baited container) would help apes to infer the location of the food. In the first two experiments, we found that if an iconic cue is given in addition to a spatial/indexical cue – e.g., picture or replica of a banana placed on the target location – apes (chimpanzees, bonobos, orangutans, gorillas) as a group performed above chance. However, we also found in two further experiments that when iconic cues were given on their own without spatial/indexical information (iconic cue held up by human with no diagnostic spatial/indexical information), the apes were back to chance performance. Our overall conclusion is that although iconic information helps apes in the process of searching hidden food, the poor performance found in the last two experiments is due to apes' lack of understanding of the informative (cooperative) communicative intention of the experimenter.
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Liebal, K., Pika, S., & Tomasello, M. (2004). Social communication in siamangs (Symphalangus syndactylus): use of gestures and facial expressions. Primates, 45(1), 41–57.
Abstract: The current study represents the first systematic investigation of the social communication of captive siamangs (Symphalangus syndactylus). The focus was on intentional signals, including tactile and visual gestures, as well as facial expressions and actions. Fourteen individuals from different groups were observed and the signals used by individuals were recorded. Thirty-one different signals, consisting of 12 tactile gestures, 8 visual gestures, 7 actions, and 4 facial expressions, were observed, with tactile gestures and facial expressions appearing most frequently. The range of the signal repertoire increased steadily until the age of six, but declined afterwards in adults. The proportions of the different signal categories used within communicative interactions, in particular actions and facial expressions, also varied depending on age. Group differences could be traced back mainly to social factors or housing conditions. Differences in the repertoire of males and females were most obvious in the sexual context. Overall, most signals were used flexibly, with the majority performed in three or more social contexts and almost one-third of signals used in combination with other signals. Siamangs also adjusted their signals appropriately for the recipient, for example, using visual signals most often when the recipient was already attending (audience effects). These observations are discussed in the context of siamang ecology, social structure, and cognition.
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Scheumann, M., & Call, J. (2004). The use of experimenter-given cues by South African fur seals (Arctocephalus pusillus). Anim. Cogn., 7(4), 224–230.
Abstract: Dogs can use a variety of experimenter-given cues such as pointing, head direction, and eye direction to locate food hidden under one of several containers. Some authors have proposed that this is a result of the domestication process. In this study we tested four captive fur seals in a two alternative object choice task in which subjects had to use one of the following experimenter-given cues to locate the food: (1) the experimenter pointed and gazed at one of the objects, (2) the experimenter pointed at only one of the objects, (3) the experimenter gazed at only one of the objects, (4) the experimenter glanced at only one of the objects, (5) the experimenter pointed and gazed at one of the objects but was sitting closer to one object than to the other, (6) the experimenter pointed only with the index finger at one of the objects, (7) the experimenter presented a replica of one of the objects. The fur seals were able to use cues which involved a fully exposed arm or a head direction, but failed to use glance only, the index finger pointing and the object replica cues. The results showed that a domestication process was not necessary to develop receptive skills to cues given by an experimenter. Instead, we hypothesize that close interactions with humans prior to testing enabled fur seals to uses ome gestural cues without formal training. We also analyzed the behavior of the seals depending on the level of difficulty of the task. Behavioral signs of hesitation increased with task difficulty. This suggests that the fur seals were sensitive to task difficulty.
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Hare, B., & Tomasello, M. (2005). Human-like social skills in dogs? Trends. Cognit. Sci., 9(9), 439–444.
Abstract: Domestic dogs are unusually skilled at reading human social and communicative behavior--even more so than our nearest primate relatives. For example, they use human social and communicative behavior (e.g. a pointing gesture) to find hidden food, and they know what the human can and cannot see in various situations. Recent comparisons between canid species suggest that these unusual social skills have a heritable component and initially evolved during domestication as a result of selection on systems mediating fear and aggression towards humans. Differences in chimpanzee and human temperament suggest that a similar process may have been an important catalyst leading to the evolution of unusual social skills in our own species. The study of convergent evolution provides an exciting opportunity to gain further insights into the evolutionary processes leading to human-like forms of cooperation and communication.
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Marino, L. (2002). Convergence of complex cognitive abilities in cetaceans and primates. Brain Behav Evol, 59(1-2), 21–32.
Abstract: What examples of convergence in higher-level complex cognitive characteristics exist in the animal kingdom? In this paper I will provide evidence that convergent intelligence has occurred in two distantly related mammalian taxa. One of these is the order Cetacea (dolphins, whales and porpoises) and the other is our own order Primates, and in particular the suborder anthropoid primates (monkeys, apes, and humans). Despite a deep evolutionary divergence, adaptation to physically dissimilar environments, and very different neuroanatomical organization, some primates and cetaceans show striking convergence in social behavior, artificial 'language' comprehension, and self-recognition ability. Taken together, these findings have important implications for understanding the generality and specificity of those processes that underlie cognition in different species and the nature of the evolution of intelligence.
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Izumi, A., & Kojima, S. (2004). Matching vocalizations to vocalizing faces in a chimpanzee (Pan troglodytes). Anim. Cogn., 7(3), 179–184.
Abstract: Auditory-visual processing of species-specific vocalizations was investigated in a female chimpanzee named Pan. The basic task was auditory-visual matching-to-sample, where Pan was required to choose the vocalizer from two test movies in response to a chimpanzee's vocalization. In experiment 1, movies of vocalizing and silent faces were paired as the test movies. The results revealed that Pan recognized the status of other chimpanzees whether they vocalized or not. In experiment 2, two different types of vocalizing faces of an identical individual were prepared as the test movies. Pan recognized the correspondence between vocalization types and faces. These results suggested that chimpanzees possess crossmodal representations of their vocalizations, as do humans. Together with the ability of vocal individual recognition, this ability might reflect chimpanzees' profound understanding of the status of other individuals.
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Fragaszy, D., & Visalberghi, E. (2004). Socially biased learning in monkeys. Learn Behav, 32(1), 24–35.
Abstract: We review socially biased learning about food and problem solving in monkeys, relying especially on studies with tufted capuchin monkeys (Cebus apella) and callitrichid monkeys. Capuchin monkeys most effectively learn to solve a new problem when they can act jointly with an experienced partner in a socially tolerant setting and when the problem can be solved by direct action on an object or substrate, but they do not learn by imitation. Capuchin monkeys are motivated to eat foods, whether familiar or novel, when they are with others that are eating, regardless of what the others are eating. Thus, social bias in learning about foods is indirect and mediated by facilitation of feeding. In most respects, social biases in learning are similar in capuchins and callitrichids, except that callitrichids provide more specific behavioral cues to others about the availability and palatability of foods. Callitrichids generally are more tolerant toward group members and coordinate their activity in space and time more closely than capuchins do. These characteristics support stronger social biases in learning in callitrichids than in capuchins in some situations. On the other hand, callitrichids' more limited range of manipulative behaviors, greater neophobia, and greater sensitivity to the risk of predation restricts what these monkeys learn in comparison with capuchins. We suggest that socially biased learning is always the collective outcome of interacting physical, social, and individual factors, and that differences across populations and species in social bias in learning reflect variations in all these dimensions. Progress in understanding socially biased learning in nonhuman species will be aided by the development of appropriately detailed models of the richly interconnected processes affecting learning.
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