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Theses, dissertations and research publications (including journal articles, conference abstracts and books) from Lund University are collected in this database. Where possible, the option to download a full text document is available. It is also possible to search for Lund University student theses in the student theses database.
| Title | Chimpanzee (Pan troglodytes) and orangutan (Pongo abelii) forethought: self-control and pre-experience in the face of future tool use. |
| Author/s | Mathias Osvath, Helena Osvath |
| Department/s |
Cognitive Science
|
| Full-text | Full text is not available in this archive |
| Alternative location (URL) | http://dx.doi.org/10.1007/s100... Restricted Access (Alternative Location) |
| Publication/Series | Animal cognition |
| Publishing year | 2008 |
| Volume | 11 |
| Issue | 4 |
| Pages | 661 - 674 |
| Document type | Journal article |
| Status | published |
| Quality controlled | yes |
| Language | English |
| Publisher | Springer Berlin / Heidelberg |
| Abstract English | Planning for future needs has traditionally been considered to be restricted to human cognition. Although recent studies on great ape and corvid cognition challenge this belief, the phylogenesis of human planning remains largely unknown. The complex skill for future planning has not yet been satisfactorily established in any other extant primate species than our own. In humans, planning for future needs rely heavily on two overarching capacities, both of which lie at the heart of our cognition: self-control, often defined as the suppression of immediate drives in favor of delayed rewards, and mental time travel, which could be described as a detached mental experience of a past or future event. Future planning is linked to additional high complexity cognition such as metacognition and a consciousness usually not attributed to animals. In a series of four experiments based on tool use, we demonstrate that chimpanzees (Pan troglodytes) and orangutans (Pongo abelii) override immediate drives in favor of future needs, and they do not merely rely on associative learning or semantic prospection when confronted with a planning task. These results suggest that great apes engage in planning for the future by out competing current drives and mentally pre-experiencing an upcoming event. This suggests that the advanced mental capacities utilized in human future planning are shared by phylogenetically more ancient species than previously believed. |
| Subject |
Biology and Life Sciences |
| ISBN/ISSN/Other |
ISSN: 1435-9448 |
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"ReSearch for the Future"
Lund University's "ReSearch for the Future" magazine (Pdf, 10 Mb) presents a range of research from across the University.