Kennedy Erica Hoy, Fragaszy Dorothy M
Department of Psychology, University of Georgia, GA, USA.
J Comp Psychol. 2008 May;122(2):167-75. doi: 10.1037/0735-7036.122.2.167.
Previous evidence has suggested that analogical reasoning (recognizing similarities among object relations when the objects themselves are dissimilar) is limited to humans and apes. This study investigated whether capuchin monkeys (Cebus apella) can use analogical reasoning to solve a 3-dimensional search task. The task involved hiding a food item under 1 of 2 or 3 plastic cups of different sizes and then allowing subjects to search for food hidden under the cup of analogous size in their own set of cups. Four monkeys were exposed to a series of relational matching tasks. If subjects reached criterion on these tasks, they were exposed to relational transfer tasks involving novel stimuli. Three of the monkeys failed to reach criterion on the basic relational matching tasks and therefore were not tested further. One monkey, however, revealed above-chance performance on a series of transfer tasks with 3 novel stimuli. This evidence suggests that contrary to previous arguments, a member of a New World monkey species can solve an analogical problem.
先前的证据表明，类比推理（当物体本身不同时识别物体关系之间的相似性）仅限于人类和猿类。本研究调查了卷尾猴（僧帽猴）是否能够使用类比推理来解决三维搜索任务。该任务包括将一个食物项藏在2个或3个不同大小的塑料杯中的其中一个下面，然后让受试者在他们自己的一组杯子中搜索藏在类似大小杯子下面的食物。四只猴子接受了一系列关系匹配任务。如果受试者在这些任务中达到标准，它们将接受涉及新刺激的关系转移任务。其中三只猴子在基本关系匹配任务中未达到标准，因此没有进一步测试。然而，有一只猴子在一系列使用3种新刺激的转移任务中表现出高于随机水平的成绩。这一证据表明，与先前的观点相反，一种新大陆猴可以解决类比问题。
