Peek a boo! Information seeking about food and functionality in capuchin monkeys.

ABSTRACT: The ability to be aware of your own knowledge state (metacognition) can be investigated by examining an individual's information-seeking behaviour. Chimpanzees (Pan troglodytes) perform strategic searches for food and tools. However, although capuchin monkeys (Sapajus apella) seek information about food, whether they search for functional information is unknown. Further, if information seeking indicates awareness of what knowledge is missing, rather than an uncertainty response, search patterns should reflect the missing information. We presented 12 capuchin monkeys with two novel information seeking tasks; Experiments 1 and 2 investigated their food search, Experiment 3 investigated their search for functionality. In both tasks information could be sought from two locations; looking below

SUBMITTER: Jordan EJ 

PROVIDER: S-EPMC12575521 | biostudies-literature | 2025 Oct

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature