Mapping the contribution of single muscles to facial movements in the rhesus macaque.

ABSTRACT: The rhesus macaque (Macaca mulatta) is the most utilized primate model in the biomedical and psychological sciences. Expressive behavior is of interest to scientists studying these animals, both as a direct variable (modeling neuropsychiatric disease, where expressivity is a primary deficit), as an indirect measure of health and welfare, and also in order to understand the evolution of communication. Here, intramuscular electrical stimulation of facial muscles was conducted in the rhesus macaque in order to document the relative contribution of each muscle to the range of facial movements and to compare the expressive function of homologous muscles in humans, chimpanzees and macaques. Despite published accounts that monkeys possess less differentiated and less complex facial musculature, t

SUBMITTER: Waller BM 

PROVIDER: S-EPMC2637410 | biostudies-literature | 2008 Sep

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature