Doctoral Dissertation Research: Socio-ecological influences on the development of primate social behavior

哪些因素有助于和阻碍个人成为社会上有能力和成功的社区成员？对于人类来说，这是一个重要但难以解决的问题。解决这个问题的一种方法是观察近亲和社交复杂的灵长类动物，以关注个体在生命之初的能力是如何发展的。该项目利用人类学、心理学和认知研究来研究野生橄榄狒狒，它们在婴儿期的社会和生态环境，以及这些相互作用影响社会发展的方式。除了为了解人类社会发展提供重要的比较数据外，该项目还支持研究生培训，正在进行的灵长类动物保护工作，以及社区教育和推广。在这个为期12个月的项目中，将收集肯尼亚Uaso Ngiro狒狒项目（UNBP）两个狒狒种群中约60名婴儿的行为数据，以研究母亲反应性和次级依恋对社会意识发展的影响。母亲是婴儿的第一个接触者和第一个社会模式，但狒狒也与群体中的成年雄性建立了牢固的关系。后一种关系可能在一个群体中尤为重要，在这个群体中，由于一种侵袭性仙人掌的传播，这种仙人掌全年提供丰富的食物，母亲们早早地给婴儿断奶。因此，我们有机会比较尚未受到额外食物影响的群体和受到额外食物影响的群体的社会能力发展。联合国环境规划署提供了关于这些群体的丰富生态和历史数据，为解释研究结果提供了背景，并阐明了群体和母亲的更广泛生态环境如何影响婴儿的社会发展。这项研究将增加灵长类动物发展的知识体系，可能为人类护理实践提供信息，支持女研究生的培训，并为当地社区教育和保护工作做出贡献。

What factors help and hinder individuals in becoming socially competent and successful members of their community? This is an important but difficult question to tackle in humans. One way to approach the question is to look at closely related and socially sophisticated primates to focus on how competence develops at the start of an individual's life. This project draws upon anthropology, psychology, and cognitive research to study wild olive baboons, their social and ecological environments during infancy, and the way these interact to influence social development. In addition to providing important comparative data for understanding human social development, the project also supports graduate student training, ongoing primate conservation efforts, and community education and outreach. During this 12-month project, behavioral data will be collected on approximately 60 infants across two baboon troops at the Uaso Ngiro Baboon Project (UNBP) in Kenya, to study the effects of maternal responsiveness and secondary attachments on the development of social awareness. The mother is the first contact and the first social model for an infant, but baboons also form strong relationships with adult males in their group. These latter relationships may be particularly important in one troop in which mothers are weaning their infants early since the spread of an invasive cactus that provides plentiful food year-round. There is therefore an opportunity to compare the development of social competence in a group not yet affected by the extra food and one that is. Rich ecological and historical data on these groups is available from UNBP, providing context for interpreting the results of the study and clarifying how infant social development is influenced by the group's and the mother's broader ecological setting. This research will add to the body of knowledge on primate development, may inform human caregiving practices, supports training of a female graduate student, and contributes to local community education and conservation efforts.