Cognitive and physiological markers of emotional awareness in chimpanzees (Pan troglodytes) |
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Authors: | Lisa A Parr |
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Institution: | (1) Yerkes Regional Primate Research Center and Living Links, Emory University, 954 Gatewood Rd., Atlanta, GA 30329, USA, |
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Abstract: | The ability to understand emotion in others is one of the most important factors involved in regulating social interactions
in primates. Such emotional awareness functions to coordinate activity among group members, enable the formation of long-lasting
individual relationships, and facilitate the pursuit of shared interests. Despite these important evolutionary implications,
comparative studies of emotional processing in humans and great apes are practically nonexistent, constituting a major gap
in our understanding of the extent to which emotional awareness has played an important role in shaping human behavior and
societies. This paper presents the results of two experiments that examine chimpanzees' responses to emotional stimuli. First,
changes in peripheral skin temperature were measured while subjects viewed three categories of emotionally negative video
scenes; conspecifics being injected with needles (INJ), darts and needles alone (DART), and conspecific directing agonism
towards the veterinarians (CHASE). Second, chimpanzees were required to use facial expressions to categorize emotional video
scenes, i.e., favorite food and objects and veterinarian procedures, according to their positive and negative valence. With
no prior training, subjects spontaneously matched the emotional videos to conspecific facial expressions according to their
shared emotional meaning, indicating that chimpanzee facial expressions are processed emotionally, as are human expressions.
Decreases in peripheral skin temperature, indicative of negative sympathetic arousal, were significantly lower when subjects
viewed the INJ and DART videos, compared to the CHASE videos, indicating greater negative arousal when viewing conspecifics
being injected with needles, and needles themselves, than when viewing conspecifics engaged in general agonism.
Accepted after revision: 8 April 2001
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Electronic Publication |
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Keywords: | Emotion Facial expressions Skin temperature Empathy |
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