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Author Bergman, T.J.; Beehner, J.C.; Cheney, D.L.; Seyfarth, R.M.
Title Hierarchical classification by rank and kinship in baboons Type Journal Article
Year 2003 Publication Science (New York, N.Y.) Abbreviated Journal Science
Volume 302 Issue 5648 Pages 1234-1236
Keywords Animals; Animals, Wild; Botswana; *Cognition; Family; Female; *Hierarchy, Social; Language; *Papio/psychology; Social Dominance; Vocalization, Animal
Abstract Humans routinely classify others according to both their individual attributes, such as social status or wealth, and membership in higher order groups, such as families or castes. They also recognize that people's individual attributes may be influenced and regulated by their group affiliations. It is not known whether such rule-governed, hierarchical classifications are specific to humans or might also occur in nonlinguistic species. Here we show that baboons recognize that a dominance hierarchy can be subdivided into family groups. In playback experiments, baboons respond more strongly to call sequences mimicking dominance rank reversals between families than within families, indicating that they classify others simultaneously according to both individual rank and kinship. The selective pressures imposed by complex societies may therefore have favored cognitive skills that constitute an evolutionary precursor to some components of human cognition.
Address Department of Biology, University of Pennsylvania, Philadelphia, PA 19104, USA. thore@sas.upenn.edu
Corporate Author Thesis
Publisher Place of Publication Editor
Language English Summary Language Original Title
Series Editor Series Title Abbreviated Series Title
Series Volume Series Issue Edition
ISSN 1095-9203 ISBN Medium
Area Expedition Conference
Notes PMID:14615544 Approved no
Call Number refbase @ user @ Serial (down) 689
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Author Seyfarth, R.M.; Cheney, D.L.
Title Meaning and emotion in animal vocalizations Type Journal Article
Year 2003 Publication Annals of the New York Academy of Sciences Abbreviated Journal Ann N Y Acad Sci
Volume 1000 Issue Pages 32-55
Keywords Acoustics; *Affect; Animals; Behavior, Animal; *Intention; Posture; Sound Spectrography; *Vocalization, Animal
Abstract Historically, a dichotomy has been drawn between the semantic communication of human language and the apparently emotional calls of animals. Current research paints a more complicated picture. Just as scientists have identified elements of human speech that reflect a speaker's emotions, field experiments have shown that the calls of many animals provide listeners with information about objects and events in the environment. Like human speech, therefore, animal vocalizations simultaneously provide others with information that is both semantic and emotional. In support of this conclusion, we review the results of field experiments on the natural vocalizations of African vervet monkeys, diana monkeys, baboons, and suricates (a South African mongoose). Vervet and diana monkeys give acoustically distinct alarm calls in response to the presence of leopards, eagles, and snakes. Each alarm call type elicits a different, adaptive response from others nearby. Field experiments demonstrate that listeners compare these vocalizations not just according to their acoustic properties but also according to the information they convey. Like monkeys, suricates give acoustically distinct alarm calls in response to different predators. Within each predator class, the calls also differ acoustically according to the signaler's perception of urgency. Like speech, therefore, suricate alarm calls convey both semantic and emotional information. The vocalizations of baboons, like those of many birds and mammals, are individually distinctive. As a result, when one baboon hears a sequence of calls exchanged between two or more individuals, the listener acquires information about social events in its group. Baboons, moreover, are skilled “eavesdroppers:” their response to different call sequences provides evidence of the sophisticated information they acquire from other individuals' vocalizations. Baboon males give loud “wahoo” calls during competitive displays. Like other vocalizations, these highly emotional calls provide listeners with information about the caller's dominance rank, age, and competitive ability. Although animal vocalizations, like human speech, simultaneously encode both semantic and emotional information, they differ from language in at least one fundamental respect. Although listeners acquire rich information from a caller's vocalization, callers do not, in the human sense, intend to provide it. Listeners acquire information as an inadvertent consequence of signaler behavior.
Address Departments of Psychology and Biology, University of Pennsylvania, Philadelphia, Pennsylvania 19104, USA. seyfarth@psych.upenn.edu
Corporate Author Thesis
Publisher Place of Publication Editor
Language English Summary Language Original Title
Series Editor Series Title Abbreviated Series Title
Series Volume Series Issue Edition
ISSN 0077-8923 ISBN Medium
Area Expedition Conference
Notes PMID:14766619 Approved no
Call Number refbase @ user @ Serial (down) 688
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Author Kitchen, D.M.; Cheney, D.L.; Seyfarth, R.M.
Title Male chacma baboons (Papio hamadryas ursinus) discriminate loud call contests between rivals of different relative ranks Type Journal Article
Year 2005 Publication Animal cognition Abbreviated Journal Anim. Cogn.
Volume 8 Issue 1 Pages 1-6
Keywords Acoustic Stimulation; Animals; *Discrimination Learning; *Hierarchy, Social; Male; Papio hamadryas/*psychology; *Social Dominance; *Vocalization, Animal
Abstract Males in multi-male groups of chacma baboons (Papio hamadryas ursinus) in Botswana compete for positions in a linear dominance hierarchy. Previous research suggests that males treat different categories of rivals differently; competitive displays between males of similar rank are more frequent and intense than those between disparately ranked males. Here we test whether males also respond differently to male-male interactions in which they are not directly involved, using playbacks of the loud 'wahoo' calls exchanged between competing males in aggressive displays. We played paired sequences of vocal contests between two adjacently ranked and two disparately ranked males to ten subjects, half ranking below the signalers in the call sequences and half above. Subjects who ranked above the two signalers showed stronger responses than lower-ranking subjects. Higher-ranking subjects also responded more strongly to sequences involving disparately ranked, as opposed to adjacently ranked opponents, suggesting that they recognized those individuals' relative ranks. Strong responses to sequences between disparately ranked opponents might have occurred either because such contests typically involve resources of high fitness value (defense of meat, estrous females or infants vulnerable to infanticide) or because they indicate a sudden change in one contestant's condition. In contrast, subjects who ranked lower than the signalers responded equally strongly to both types of sequences. These subjects may have been able to distinguish between the two categories of opponents but did not respond differently to them because they had little to lose or gain by a rank reversal between males that already ranked higher than they did.
Address Department of Psychology, University of Pennsylvania, Philadelphia, PA 19104, USA. dkitchen@psych.upenn.edu
Corporate Author Thesis
Publisher Place of Publication Editor
Language English Summary Language Original Title
Series Editor Series Title Abbreviated Series Title
Series Volume Series Issue Edition
ISSN 1435-9448 ISBN Medium
Area Expedition Conference
Notes PMID:15164259 Approved no
Call Number refbase @ user @ Serial (down) 687
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Author Manser, M.B.; Seyfarth, R.M.; Cheney, D.L.
Title Suricate alarm calls signal predator class and urgency Type
Year 2002 Publication Trends in Cognitive Sciences Abbreviated Journal Trends. Cognit. Sci.
Volume 6 Issue 2 Pages 55-57
Keywords
Abstract
Address
Corporate Author Thesis
Publisher Place of Publication Editor
Language English Summary Language Original Title
Series Editor Series Title Abbreviated Series Title
Series Volume Series Issue Edition
ISSN 1364-6613 ISBN Medium
Area Expedition Conference
Notes PMID:15866180 Approved no
Call Number refbase @ user @ Serial (down) 686
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Author Seyfarth, R.M.; Cheney, D.L.
Title The Structure of Social Knowledge in Monkeys Type Book Chapter
Year 2003 Publication Animal Social Complexity: Intelligence, Culture, and Individualized Societies Abbreviated Journal
Volume Issue Pages
Keywords
Abstract
Address
Corporate Author Thesis
Publisher Harvard University Press Place of Publication Cambridge, Massachusetts Editor F. B. M. de Waal; P. L. Tyack
Language English Summary Language Original Title Animal Social Complexity: Intelligence, Culture, and Individualized Societies
Series Editor Series Title Abbreviated Series Title
Series Volume Series Issue Edition
ISSN ISBN 978-0674009295 Medium
Area Expedition Conference
Notes Approved no
Call Number refbase @ user @ Serial (down) 464
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Author Seyfarth, R.M.; Cheney, D.L.; Marler, P.
Title Monkey responses to three different alarm calls: evidence of predator classification and semantic communication Type Journal Article
Year 1980 Publication Science (New York, N.Y.) Abbreviated Journal Science
Volume 210 Issue 4471 Pages 801-803
Keywords *Animal Communication; Animals; Behavior, Animal/*physiology; Cercopithecidae/*physiology; *Fear; Female; Male; Predatory Behavior; Vocalization, Animal
Abstract Vervet monkeys give different alarm calls to different predators. Recordings of the alarms played back when predators were absent caused the monkeys to run into trees for leopard alarms, look up for eagle alarms, and look down for snake alarms. Adults call primarily to leopards, martial eagles, and pythons, but infants give leopard alarms to various mammals, eagle alarms to many birds, and snake alarms to various snakelike objects. Predator classification improves with age and experience.
Address
Corporate Author Thesis
Publisher Place of Publication Editor
Language English Summary Language Original Title
Series Editor Series Title Abbreviated Series Title
Series Volume Series Issue Edition
ISSN 0036-8075 ISBN Medium
Area Expedition Conference
Notes PMID:7433999 Approved no
Call Number refbase @ user @ Serial (down) 351
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Author Cheney, D.L.; Seyfarth, R.M.; Silk, J.B.
Title The responses of female baboons (Papio cynocephalus ursinus) to anomalous social interactions: evidence for causal reasoning? Type Journal Article
Year 1995 Publication Journal of comparative psychology (Washington, D.C. : 1983) Abbreviated Journal J Comp Psychol
Volume 109 Issue 2 Pages 134-141
Keywords Animals; Attention; Auditory Perception; *Awareness; *Concept Formation; *Dominance-Subordination; Fear; Female; Hierarchy, Social; Papio/*psychology; *Social Behavior; Social Environment; Vocalization, Animal
Abstract Baboons' (Papio cynocephalus ursinus) understanding of cause-effect relations in the context of social interactions was examined through use of a playback experiment. Under natural conditions, dominant female baboons often grunt to more subordinate mothers when interacting with their infants. Mothers occasionally respond to these grunts by uttering submissive fear barks. Subjects were played causally inconsistent call sequences in which a lower ranking female apparently grunted to a higher ranking female, and the higher ranking female apparently responded with fear barks. As a control, subjects heard a sequence made causally consistent by the inclusion of grunts from a 3rd female that was dominant to both of the others. Subjects responded significantly more strongly to the causally inconsistent sequences, suggesting that they recognized the factors that cause 1 individual to give submissive vocalizations to another.
Address Department of Biology, University of Pennsylvania, Philadelphia 19104, USA
Corporate Author Thesis
Publisher Place of Publication Editor
Language English Summary Language Original Title
Series Editor Series Title Abbreviated Series Title
Series Volume Series Issue Edition
ISSN 0735-7036 ISBN Medium
Area Expedition Conference
Notes PMID:7758289 Approved no
Call Number refbase @ user @ Serial (down) 348
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Author Cheney, D.L.; Seyfarth, R.M.
Title Reconciliatory grunts by dominant female baboons influence victims' behaviour Type Journal Article
Year 1997 Publication Animal Behaviour. Abbreviated Journal Anim. Behav.
Volume 54 Issue 2 Pages 409-418
Keywords
Abstract Following aggressive interactions, dominant female baboons, Papio cynocephalus ursinusoccasionally grunt to their victims. To examine the effect of these apparently reconciliatory grunts on victims' subsequent behaviour, a series of playback experiments was designed to mimic reconciliation. Victims were played their opponents' grunts in the minutes immediately following a fight and then observed for half an hour. After hearing these grunts, victims approached their former opponents and also tolerated their opponents' approaches at significantly higher rates than they did under control conditions. They were also supplanted by their opponents at significantly lower rates. By contrast, playbacks of control females' grunts did not influence victims' behaviour. Playbacks of reconciliatory grunts did not increase the rate at which opponents approached or initiated friendly interactions with their former victims. Playbacks of reconciliatory grunts, therefore, appeared to influence victims', but not opponents', perception of recent events.
Address Departments of Biology and Psychology, University of Pennsylvania
Corporate Author Thesis
Publisher Place of Publication Editor
Language English Summary Language Original Title
Series Editor Series Title Abbreviated Series Title
Series Volume Series Issue Edition
ISSN 0003-3472 ISBN Medium
Area Expedition Conference
Notes PMID:9268473 Approved no
Call Number refbase @ user @ Serial (down) 347
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Author Cheney, D.L.; Seyfarth, R.M.
Title Recognition of other individuals' social relationships by female baboons Type Journal Article
Year 1999 Publication Animal Behaviour. Abbreviated Journal Anim. Behav.
Volume 58 Issue 1 Pages 67-75
Keywords
Abstract We describe a series of playback experiments designed to test whether free-ranging baboons, Papio cynocephalus ursinus, recognize the calls of other group members and also associate signallers with their close genetic relatives. Pairs of unrelated females were played sequences of calls that mimicked a fight between their relatives. As controls, the same females heard sequences that involved either (1) only the more dominant female's relative or (2) neither of the females' relatives. When call sequences involved their relatives, subjects looked towards the speaker for a longer duration than when the sequences involved nonkin. When the sequences involved the other female's relative, they also looked towards that female. Subjects did not look towards one another when call sequences involved nonkin. Dominant subjects were more likely to supplant their subordinate partners following playbacks of sequences that mimicked a dispute between their relatives than following the two control trials. In contrast, both subjects were more likely to approach one another and to interact in a friendly manner following the two control trials than following the test trial. Results indicate that female baboons recognize the screams and threat grunts not only of their own close relatives but also of unrelated individuals. They also replicate previous studies in suggesting that female monkeys recognize the close associates of other individuals and adjust their interactions with others according to recent events involving individuals other than themselves. Copyright 1999 The Association for the Study of Animal Behaviour.
Address Departments of Biology and Psychology, University of Pennsylvania
Corporate Author Thesis
Publisher Place of Publication Editor
Language English Summary Language Original Title
Series Editor Series Title Abbreviated Series Title
Series Volume Series Issue Edition
ISSN 0003-3472 ISBN Medium
Area Expedition Conference
Notes PMID:10413542 Approved no
Call Number refbase @ user @ Serial (down) 346
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Author Seyfarth, R.M.; Cheney, D.L.
Title Cognitive strategies and the representation of social relations by monkeys Type Journal Article
Year 2001 Publication Nebraska Symposium on Motivation. Nebraska Symposium on Motivation Abbreviated Journal Nebr Symp Motiv
Volume 47 Issue Pages 145-177
Keywords Adaptation, Biological; Animals; *Evolution; Family; Female; Haplorhini; Male; Memory; Primates; *Selection (Genetics); *Social Behavior; Social Dominance; *Social Perception
Abstract
Address University of Pennsylvania, USA
Corporate Author Thesis
Publisher Place of Publication Editor
Language English Summary Language Original Title
Series Editor Series Title Abbreviated Series Title
Series Volume Series Issue Edition
ISSN 0146-7875 ISBN Medium
Area Expedition Conference
Notes PMID:11759347 Approved no
Call Number refbase @ user @ Serial (down) 345
Permanent link to this record