True handedness in the cotton-top tamarin (Saguinus oedipus)?

Abstract

ABSTRACT. Hand use for 8 activities was studied in 20 captive cotton-top tamarins (Saguinus oedipus). The purpose of the study was to discover if hand preferences existed across tasks and across subjects, and, if so, whether these followed the patterns of preference in MACNEILAGE et al.'s (1987) "postural origins" theory of the evolution of hand preference and hemispheric specialization in primates. This theory suggests that, for haplorines, the right hand is used preferentially for manipulative acts while the left hand is used preferentially for visually guided acts. The study showed statistically significant right hand preferences for six of the seven actions which produced sufficient data to be tested. The strength and consistency of this preference makes this study the first to suggest true handedness in a non-human primate species. Deviations from the pattern were seen in scratching and other actions when performed in a vertical posture, but these deviations took the form of a weakening of the right hand preference rather than a reversal. The findings of the study may be seen as supporting MACNEILAGE et al. 's (1987) theory only if the actions studied are all considered to be manipulative, which can be argued to be the case, though some of the actions were also visually guided.

A study of correlates of hand preferences in squirrel monkeys (Saimiri sciureus)

“…The apparent increase in the degree of lateralized hand use which all animals showed when adopting a bipedal posture (Tasks B, C, and D) compared to a quadrupedal posture (Task A) is in line with reports from several other primate species (ANDERSON et al, 1996;DEVLEESCHOUWER et al, 1995;DIAMOND & MCGREW, 1994;HOPKINS, 1993) and illustrates that measurement of simple food reaching from the floor alone may give a rather incomplete picture of functional forelimb laterality in a primate species.…”

Lateralized Functions in the Dog Brain

“…Dogs with stronger paw preference are otherwise more confident and relaxed in an unfamiliar environment and when presented with novel stimuli [76]; on the contrary, they are less The existence of motor asymmetries at a population level is currently a subject of wide debate. It has been reported in several species, including humans [54], non-human primates [55,56], rats [57], humpback whales [58] and common European toads [59] but studies on other animals, as for example marmosets [60], sheep [61,62], cats [63] and horses [64,65], has shown a motor bias only at the individual-level. However, the same species may also display a limb preference at the level of population or at the individual level depending on the task, as found in monkeys [66,67], cats [68] and sheep [69].…”

Fluctuating and directional asymmetry in the long bones of captive cotton‐top tamarins (Saguinus oedipus)

“…We selected tamarins because they are quadrupedal primates without documented species-wide patterns of asymmetry (Diamond and McGrew, 1994;Gangestad and Thornhill, 1999;Papademetriou et al, 2005;Chapelain et al, 2006;Smith and Thompson, 2011;cf. Hook and Rogers, 2002); this, coupled with the use of all limbs during locomotion, argues against an expectation of significant directional asymmetry.…”