Identification of facial expressions of emotions in Capuchin monkeys (Cebus Apella)
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1
Dept. Physiol. Sci., Lab. of Neurosci. & Behav, Univ. of Brasília, Brazil
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2
Dept of Biomed. Sci. & Technol., Fac. of Sciences of Education, Univ. of L’Aquila, Italy
In human primates, pictures with emotional content are more easily recognized compared to emotionally neutral pictures. Non-human primates share several cognitive and physiological characteristics with humans and, therefore, they represent an important and relevant model in studies focused on the identification of facial expression of emotion. In this study we developed a set of 384 pictures of capuchin monkey (Cebus apella) faces, classified according to their emotional valence (positive/pleasant, negative/unpleasant and neutral/indifferent), to examine whether working memory can benefit from the emotional content of visual stimuli in delayed non-matching to sample task (DNMTS). Seven adult capuchin monkeys were tested with a computer system and touch screen. Geometric figures (control) and the co-specific faces pictures were used as stimuli. A similar performance to positive, negative and neutral pictures was obtained. However, the monkeys performed above the upper confidence limits around chance to all kinds of stimulus, showing that they are able to learn the tests using emotional faces. Furthermore, the capuchin monkeys had much better performance when using geometric figures compared with the co-specific pictures. This preliminary study yielded findings that are of relevance for a better understanding of the influences of emotional expressiveness on memory. Our data indicate the possible usefulness of applying the paradigm utilized in this study to investigate emotional working memory in non-human primates.
Conference:
10th International Conference on Cognitive Neuroscience, Bodrum, Türkiye, 1 Sep - 5 Sep, 2008.
Presentation Type:
Poster Presentation
Topic:
Memory & Learning
Citation:
Tavares
MC,
Gasbarri
A,
Pompili
A,
D’Onofrio
A,
Abreu
CT and
Tomaz
C
(2008). Identification of facial expressions of emotions in Capuchin monkeys (Cebus Apella).
Conference Abstract:
10th International Conference on Cognitive Neuroscience.
doi: 10.3389/conf.neuro.09.2009.01.303
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Received:
10 Dec 2008;
Published Online:
10 Dec 2008.
*
Correspondence:
Antonella Gasbarri, Dept of Biomed. Sci. & Technol., Fac. of Sciences of Education, Univ. of L’Aquila, L'Aquila, Italy, antonella.gasbarri@cc.univaq.it