Female bearded capuchin monkeys (Sapajus libidinosus) use objects to solicit the sexual partner.

Abstract

Female wild bearded capuchins (Sapajus libidinosus) living at Serra da Capivara National Park (SCNP) that use stone and stick tools during foraging occasionally toss or throw stones at the male during courtship. We report similar behaviors in a different population that uses stones as tools in foraging. We video-recorded the sexual behavior of four females (27 days during nine proceptive periods) belonging to a group of wild capuchins living in Fazenda Boa Vista (FBV), 320 km from SCNP. Three females used stones or branches when they solicited the alpha male (79 episodes). The female that did not use objects was the sole female to solicit a subordinate male. The vast majority of episodes (95%) involved pushing or dropping branches, both loose and attached to the tree, toward the male. Females used objects only during the one-way courtship phase, before the male reciprocated the female's solicitations. In 93% of the episodes in which a female used objects, she performed affiliative behaviors immediately before or after using the objects. We conclude that throwing or pounding stones and pushing or dropping branches by females in SCNP and FBV in the sexual context have a clear affiliative meaning (to attract the male's attention). Given the tool-using status of both populations where these behaviors have been reported, it is important to determine whether they appear in populations that do not use tools, or are restricted to populations already primed to use objects in other contexts. (PsycINFO Database Record

A longitudinal assessment of behavioral development in wild capuchins: Personality is not established in the first 3 years

“…Capuchin monkeys ( Sapajus spp.) are known for their cognitive skills, including the use of tools for foraging (Fragaszy, Izar, Visalberghi, Ottoni, & de Oliveira, 2004) and other purposes (Falótico, Siqueira, & Ottoni, 2017; Visalberghi, Di Bernardi, Marino, Fragaszy, & Izar, 2017), and also for their social complexity (Izar et al, 2012). The genus comprises eight species widely distributed across South America (Lynch Alfaro et al, 2012).…”

A robust tool kit: First report of tool use in captive crested capuchin monkeys (Sapajus robustus)

“…X = observed in present study. Literature cited in Table 1: (1) Mendes et al (2000), (2) Visalberghi et al (2017), (3) Westergaard and Fragaszy (1985), (4) Westergaard and Fragaszy (1987), (5) Moura and Lee (2004), (6) Westergaard and Suomi (1994a), (7) Mannu and Ottoni (2009), (8) Moura and Lee (2010), (9) Torralvo et al (2017), (10) Giudice and Pavé (2007), (11) Westergaard and Suomi (1995), ( 12) Serbena and Monteiro-Filho (2002), (13) Fragaszy, Izar, et al (2004), ( 14) Mendes et al (2015), (15) Ottoni and Mannu (2001) Cooper and Harlow (1961), (33) Visalberghi and Trinca (1989), (34) Falótico and Ottoni (2013), ( 35) Moura (2007), (36) Hamilton and Fragaszy (2014), (37) Lessa et al (2001), (38) Visalberghi and Fragaszy (1990).…”

Must all signals be evolved? A proposal for a new classification of communicative acts

“…In captive settings, chimpanzees use several invented, attention-getting sounds or vocalizations (Hopkins, Taglialatela, & Leavens, 2007), which are transmitted from mother to offspring (Taglialatela, Reamer, Schapiro, & Hopkins, 2012). In the nonvocal domain, invented communicative behaviors have been described for two different species of capuchins: novel social conventions in white-faced capuchins ("hand-sniffing", "sucking", "finger-in-mouth game") (Perry et al, 2003), and the "stone throwing display" exhibited by proceptive females of bearded capuchin monkeys to solicit copulations from males (Falótico & Ottoni, 2013;Visalberghi, Di Bernardi, Marino, Fragaszy, & Izar, 2017). In some habituated groups, wild capuchins have been observed to use stone-banging in aggressive displays that seem to deter predators (i.e., in interspecific communication) (Moura, 2007).…”