Studies of chimpanzee spatial cognition and foraging

描述(申请人提供)：对于人类来说，回忆环境特征和过去事件的能力是思考、规划和交流的基础，但几乎没有关于非语言动物回忆能力的数据。关于黑猩猩回忆能力上限的数据，以及限制回忆的因素的数据，将有助于更详细地理解人类和非人类记忆系统之间的相似和差异，以及改进的回忆记忆动物模型。这个项目的长期目标是表征黑猩猩的回忆记忆能力，这些记忆能力是关于环境的沟通的基础，并有助于解决觅食问题。具体目标1是评估黑猩猩对一个事件的多个特征的回忆记忆。假设1：黑猩猩具有情节记忆的能力，它们能够回忆和交流他们所看到的东西，他们看到了什么，他们在哪里看到了，谁参与了，以及所使用的任何物体的特征。具体目标2是确定黑猩猩可以在一次报告会议上回忆和传达关于过去事件的这些不同类型的信息中的哪些。假设2：在一次试验中，黑猩猩可以在一份相当详细的报告中传达过去事件的多种特征(维度)。具体目标3是表征黑猩猩对大范围空间的回忆和表征记忆。假设3：黑猩猩能够回忆和交流大范围空间中物体的类型和位置，这表明：a)它们使用人工语言(词汇)来了解远处目标物体的位置，b)它们使用词汇来报告完全看不到的区域中目标物体的位置。具体目标4是描述黑猩猩在广阔的空间区域内回忆、排序和顺序访问多种食物资源的能力。假设4：黑猩猩根据质量、数量、接近程度、能见度和发生时间对多个远距离资源的期望值进行排序，然后根据它们的排名顺序访问资源。这项研究将增加灵长类动物基本记忆和规划能力的科学知识。这项研究的公共健康益处预计将包括改进技术和方法，以研究和提高正常儿童和发育迟缓儿童的记忆、规划、交流和空间定向技能。

DESCRIPTION (provided by applicant): For humans, the ability to recall environmental features and past events underlies thinking, planning, and communication, but there are almost no data on recall capabilities in nonverbal animals. Data on the upper limits of recall capabilities in chimpanzees, and on the factors that limit recall, will lead to a more detailed understanding of the similarities and differences between human and nonhuman memory systems to improved animal models of recall memory. The long-term objective of this project is to characterize recall memory capabilities of chimpanzees that underlie communication about the environment and that contribute to the solution of foraging problems. Specific Aim 1 is to assess chimpanzees' recall memory of multiple features of an event. Hypothesis 1: Chimpanzees are capable of episodic memory, as evidenced by their ability to recall and communicate what they saw, where they saw it, who was involved, and features of any objects employed. Specific Aim 2 is to determine which of these different types of information a chimpanzee can recall and convey about a past event at a single reporting session. Hypothesis 2: Chimpanzees can convey multiple features (dimensions) of a past event in a fairly detailed report during a single trial. Specific Aim 3 is to characterize chimpanzees' recall and representational memory of large-scale space. Hypothesis 3: Chimpanzees are capable of recalling and communicating the types and locations of objects in large-scale space, as indicated by: a) their ability to use an artificial language (lexigrams) to learn where distant goal objects are located, and b) their ability to use lexigrams to report the locations of goal objects that are in areas that are completely out of view. Specific Aim 4 is to characterize chimpanzees' ability to recall, rank order, and sequentially visit multiple food resources over a wide spatial area. Hypothesis 4: Chimpanzees rank-order the expected value of multiple distant resources based on quality, quantity, proximity, visibility, and time of occurrence, and then visit the resources sequentially according to their ranking. The research will increase scientific knowledge of basic memory and planning capabilities in primates. Public health benefits of the research are expected to include improved technologies and methods for studying and enhancing memory, planning, communication, and spatial orientation skills in normal and developmentally delayed children.