Bonnie Kristin E, Bernstein-Kurtycz Laura M, Shender Marisa A, Ross Stephen R, Hopper Lydia M
Department of Psychology, Beloit College, Beloit, WI, USA.
Lester E. Fisher Center for the Study and Conservation of Apes, Lincoln Park Zoo, Chicago, IL, USA.
Primates. 2019 Mar;60(2):125-131. doi: 10.1007/s10329-018-00712-x. Epub 2019 Feb 26.
This study was designed to investigate the foraging behavior of zoo-housed western lowland gorillas (Gorilla gorilla gorilla) and compare it with that of zoo-housed chimpanzees (Pan trogloydytes) tested previously in a similar paradigm. Specifically, we aimed to document how a group of zoo-housed gorillas foraged within a familiar environment to discover novel food sources and whether they sought out more preferred foods, even if they had to travel further to reach them, as they do in the wild. Gorillas were provided plastic tokens to exchange with researchers at two locations-at the same location as the tokens (close) for carrot pieces and another 6.5 m away (far) for grapes. Over the course of 30 sessions, a single individual-the silverback male-accounted for 96% of the 1546 tokens exchanged, all of which took place at the far location. Inter-individual distance measures collected during each session, as well as during matched control sessions, showed that while both gorillas and chimpanzees express similar patterns of social association across the two conditions, the average dyadic association for chimpanzees was stronger than that for gorillas. Together, these findings provide an example of the value of employing identical methodologies to compare cognition and behavior across species as well highlight the importance of the social context in which studies take place.
本研究旨在调查圈养的西部低地大猩猩（Gorilla gorilla gorilla）的觅食行为，并将其与之前在类似范式中测试过的圈养黑猩猩（Pan trogloydytes）的觅食行为进行比较。具体而言，我们旨在记录一群圈养的大猩猩在熟悉的环境中如何觅食以发现新的食物来源，以及它们是否会寻找更偏好的食物，即使它们必须走更远的路才能获取，就像它们在野外那样。给大猩猩提供塑料代币，以便它们在两个地点与研究人员交换——在放置代币的同一地点（近处）换取胡萝卜片，在6.5米外的另一个地点（远处）换取葡萄。在30次实验过程中，唯一进行交换的个体是一只银背雄性大猩猩，它完成了1546次代币交换中的96%，所有这些交换都发生在远处的地点。在每次实验以及匹配的对照实验中收集的个体间距离测量结果表明，虽然大猩猩和黑猩猩在两种情况下都表现出相似的社会关联模式，但黑猩猩的平均二元关联比大猩猩更强。总之，这些发现提供了一个例子，说明采用相同方法跨物种比较认知和行为的价值，同时也凸显了研究开展所处社会背景的重要性。
