In mixed company: two macaws are self-regarding in a symbolic prosocial choice task

Leete, Jessica; Vonk, Jennifer

doi:10.1007/s00265-021-03123-z

Cited by 3 publications

(1 citation statement)

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“…Therefore, the choices were meaningful even if the pattern of responding does not fit into our a priori predictions of how gorillas might respond in a prosocial choice task. These data add to the growing body of work suggesting that nonhuman animals can attend to choices that are consistent with self‐interest in a symbolic prosocial choice test (Leete & Vonk, 2022; Verspeek, Van Leeuwen, Laméris, Staes, et al, 2022; Verspeek, Van Leeuwen, Laméris, Stevens, 2022). This was the first test of prosocial preferences in a bachelor group of half‐sibling gorillas and one of the first studies to allow individuals to choose whom to be prosocial toward (Emigh et al, 2020; Yamamoto & Tanaka, 2010).…”

Section: Discussionsupporting

confidence: 56%

Prosocial or photo preferences? Gorillas' prosocial choices using a touchscreen

Vonk

2024

American J Primatol

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Three male Western lowland gorillas (Gorilla gorilla gorilla) were given the opportunity to select their own or conspecific photos on a touchscreen to indicate whether they wished the experimenter to deliver a food reward only to them or to them and the selected conspecific(s). This is only the second symbolic test of prosocial preferences with apes using a touchscreen, and the first with gorillas. The use of self and other photographs as symbols of prosocial choices was intuitive while controlling for the distraction of visible food rewards, and allowing for tests of transfer to further validate apparent prosocial intentions. Gorillas rapidly learned to avoid selecting a photograph of an empty enclosure that resulted in no rewards for any of the gorillas and transferred this learning to a novel photograph. The gorillas did not behave in a consistently self‐interested or prosocial manner but they clearly rejected the opportunity to choose spitefully. Their preferences for certain photographs did not necessarily reflect a preference to be prosocial toward that particular individual because these preferences did not transfer to novel photographs of the same individuals. The results call into question whether gorillas recognize themselves and conspecifics in photographs but cannot conclusively speak to whether gorillas have prosocial preferences. They do stress the importance of carefully probing alternative explanations when inferring intentions from observable behaviors.

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Section: Discussionsupporting

confidence: 56%

Prosocial or photo preferences? Gorillas' prosocial choices using a touchscreen

Vonk

2024

American J Primatol

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Mixed evidence for intralocus sexual conflict from male-limited selection inDrosophila melanogaster

Thyagarajan,

Sayyed,

Baroody

et al. 2024

Preprint

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Sexual conflict over shared traits - intralocus sexual conflict (IaSC) - may be common and consequential, but experimental tests of its relative magnitude are challenging and limited in number. We use a sex-limited selection experiment, designed to subject genomic haplotypes of Drosophila melanogaster to selection for male fitness without opposing selection acting on female fitness. Importantly, we use three novel base populations to compare results with those from the LHM population, the sole population investigated using this technique. In contrast with previous studies, we find that male fitness of haplotypes subject to male-limited selection (ML populations) are not consistently better than their matched (MC) controls when tested in the "wildtype" state. Males from ML lines did not outperform controls in competitive fitness assays, mate choice trials, fecundity induction or sperm offense tests. As predicted, genetic variation for male fitness was reduced, with low fitness haplotypes apparently removed by selection, but this was only surveyed in one replicate population pair and included a potential artefact in the protocol. Female fitness was markedly reduced by carriage of ML genomic haplotypes, as predicted by sexual antagonism. Hence, our results are only partially consistent with the IaSC hypothesis, raising questions about the relative contribution of sexual conflict to the standing genetic variation in these populations and the potential role of artefacts in the protocol that may have obscured our ability to detect IaSC.

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Teamwork Makes the String Work: A Pilot Test of the Loose String Task with African Crested Porcupines (Hystrix cristata)

Truax

Vonk

Vincent

et al. 2022

JZBG

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Comparative researchers have heavily focused their studies of social cognition on species that live in large social groups, while neglecting other potential predictors of social cognition. African crested porcupines (Hystrix cristata) are relatively rare among mammals in that they are cooperative breeders that pair for life. Little is known about their social cognition, but they are good candidates for exploring cooperative behavior due to the need to coordinate behavior to cooperatively raise young. Cooperation, as defined in this study, is the process by which two or more participants perform independent actions on an object to obtain a reward for all parties. Humans are thought to outperform all other species in the frequency and magnitude of cooperative behaviors. Yet, only by studying a variety of species can researchers fully understand the likely selection pressures for cooperation, such as cooperative breeding. Here, we pilot tested the feasibility of the popular loose-string task with a mated pair of African crested porcupines, a task that required the porcupines to cooperatively pull ropes to access an out of reach platform baited with food rewards. Other species presented with this task were able to work together to receive rewards but did not always demonstrate understanding of the role of their partner. The porcupines achieved success but did not appear to coordinate their actions or solicit behavior from their partner. Thus, similar to other species, they may achieve success in this task without taking their partner’s role into account. This study demonstrates that the loose string task can be used to assess cooperation in porcupines. However, further experiments are needed to assess the porcupine’s understanding of their partner’s role under this paradigm.

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In mixed company: two macaws are self-regarding in a symbolic prosocial choice task

Cited by 3 publications

References 68 publications

Prosocial or photo preferences? Gorillas' prosocial choices using a touchscreen

Prosocial or photo preferences? Gorillas' prosocial choices using a touchscreen

Mixed evidence for intralocus sexual conflict from male-limited selection inDrosophila melanogaster

Teamwork Makes the String Work: A Pilot Test of the Loose String Task with African Crested Porcupines (Hystrix cristata)

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