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Author (up) Hostetter, A.B.; Russell, J.L.; Freeman, H.; Hopkins, W.D.
Title Now you see me, now you don't: evidence that chimpanzees understand the role of the eyes in attention Type Journal Article
Year 2007 Publication Animal Cognition Abbreviated Journal Anim. Cogn.
Volume 10 Issue 1 Pages 55-62
Keywords Animal Husbandry/methods; Animals; *Attention; Awareness; Female; Fixation, Ocular/*physiology; Humans; Male; Pan troglodytes/*psychology; *Social Behavior; *Social Perception
Abstract Chimpanzees appear to understand something about the attentional states of others; in the present experiment, we investigated whether they understand that the attentional state of a human is based on eye gaze. In all, 116 adult chimpanzees were offered food by an experimenter who engaged in one of the four experimental manipulations: eyes closed, eyes open, hand over eyes, and hand over mouth. The communicative behavior of the chimpanzees was observed. More visible behaviors were produced when the experimenter's eyes were visible than when the experimenter's eyes were not visible. More vocalizations were produced when the experimenter's eyes were closed than when they were open, but there were no differences in other attention getting behaviors. There was no effect of age or rearing history. The results suggest that chimpanzees use the presence of the eyes as a cue that their visual gestures will be effective.
Address Department of Psychology, University of Wisconsin-Madison, 1202 W. Johnson Street, Madison, WI 53706, USA. abhostetter@wisc.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:16847659 Approved no
Call Number Equine Behaviour @ team @ Serial 2457
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