Cognitive dimensions of orangutan ranging in east borneo

本项目旨在探索东婆罗洲猩猩（Pongo pygmaeus morio）的认知和社会生态基础。关于猩猩地理差异的新发现将莫里奥确定为猩猩适应的极端：莫里奥面临最恶劣的生态条件，相应地在身体、发育和行为上都是独特的。然而，大多数莫里奥数据来自20-25年前，虽然与这些发现一致，但大多数数据不具备验证这些发现所需的质量，并且它们表明了其他区别。这些数据也可能反映出不再存在的情况。由于自然灾害和人类的发展，森里奥的栖息地已经发生了变化，所以现在许多猩猩在破碎和受损的栖息地中生存，或者被重新安置到陌生的猩猩居住的新地区。需要进行新的研究来解决这些限制，而范围的灵活性，即空间的使用，是一个很好的起点。首先，猩猩的迁徙是由它们适应的基础因素决定的：食物、社会性、发育、学习和认知。其次，范围的灵活性对于应对它们在时间和空间上极不均匀的食物供应至关重要。这种灵活性很大程度上归功于认知能力，但认知能力对猩猩的影响很少被研究。最近对灵长类动物空间认知的研究可以丰富对morio测距的研究：它为评估可能的灵活性提供了模型和方法，例如，心理地图的性质和如何处理旅行路线。该项目的主要目标是通过将研究延长整整五年，并使用认知和标准方法，更新对相对完整栖息地正常morio范围灵活性的理解。如有机会，还可通过对生活在受损生境和搬迁到新地区的莫里奥的平行研究，有助于评估其范围灵活性的限制。研究结果将有助于进一步了解猩猩和类人猿的空间认知、morio本身以及猩猩的地理变异。调查结果还应有助于保护，例如澄清morio议程和生境利用以及重新安置的有效性。

This project aims to explore cognitive and socio-ecological bases of ranging flexibilities in east Bornean orangutans (Pongo pygmaeus morio). New findings on geographic variation in orangutans identify morio as the extreme of orangutan adaptation: morio faces the harshest ecological conditions and is correspondingly distinct physically, developmentally, and behaviorally. However, most morio data date from 20-25 years ago and while consistent with these findings, most are not of the quality needed to verify them and they suggest other distinctions. These data may also reflect conditions that no longer exist. Morio's habitat has since been transformed by natural disasters and human development, so many now survive in fragmented and damaged habitat or have been relocated into new areas inhabited by unfamiliar orangutans. New studies are needed to address these limitations, and flexibility in ranging, i.e., the use of space, is a good place to start. First, orangutan ranging is determined by cornerstones of their adaptation: food, sociality, development, learning, and cognition. Second, ranging flexibility is essential to cope with their food supply, which is extremely patchy in time and space. This flexibility owes much to cognition but cognitive contributions to orangutan ranging have rarely been studied. Recent research on primate spatial cognition could then enrich the study of morio ranging: it offers models and methods for assessing bases for the flexibilities possible, e.g., the nature of mental maps and how travel routes are handled. This project's main goal is to update understanding of normal morio ranging flexibility in relatively intact habitat, by extending study over five full years and by using cognitive as well as standard methods. As opportunities arise, it may also contribute to assessing the limits of their ranging flexibilities via parallel studies of morio living in damaged habitat and relocated to new areas. Findings should enhance understanding of orangutan and great ape spatial cognition, of morio itself, and of geographic variation in orangutans. Findings should also assist conservation by, e.g., clarifying morio agendas and habitat use and the effectiveness of relocations.