[monkeywire] Monkeys think about who's watching before they steal
miahzinn at monkeylove.net
miahzinn at monkeylove.net
Tue Mar 8 14:09:09 EST 2005
http://www.boingboing.net/2005/03/07/monkeys_think_about_.html
<from boing boing>
Yale psychologists report that rhesus monkeys think about whether
they'll be seen by others before swiping food that doesn't belong to
them. Essentially, they check to see where their "competitors" are
looking before they act. From a press release about the study,
published in this week's issue of the scientific journal Current
Biology:
"These latest results... suggest that rhesus monkeys can do much more
than just follow the gaze of others; they can also deduce what others
see and know, based only on their perception of where others are
looking. These data potentially push back the time during which our own
abilities to "read the minds of others" must have evolved. Moreover,
they suggest strongly a reason why these abilities may have evolved in
the first place, namely for competitive interactions with others.
Finally, these results lay the groundwork for investigating the neural
basis for this kind of social reasoning in a readily available
laboratory animal – an urgent endeavor for developing a better neural
understanding of diseases such as autism, in which this kind of social
reasoning appears impaired."
http://www.eurekalert.org/pub_releases/2005-03/cp-rmc030305.php
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