Excited to share our methods preprint on CapuchinAI! 🐒💻
We built a field touchscreen + real-time facial recognition system (YOLOv7) that lets wild capuchins “log in” and complete individualized cognitive tasks.
@emoryuniversity.bsky.social @gatechengineers.bsky.social
#PrimateCognition #AI
Check out @apesemory.bsky.social grad student @ecunningham96.bsky.social discuss his work on same-sex behavior in primates!
Listen to @ecunningham96.bsky.social explain how this research project idea began - "From pathology to pleasure Reframing mechanistic studies on same-sex sexual behavior in primates"
Recently, graduate students @nicolefurgala.bsky.social, Federico Sánchez Vargas, and Amber Shaw were awarded Lewis and Clark Expedition grants. Evan Cunningham was also awarded a Leakey Foundation Research Grant. We are so excited to see their research advance!
Graduate student Evan Cunningham (Advisor: @mebenitez.bsky.social) is also working on field research at the Taboga forest reserve, studying social learning in capuchins.🐵🧠
Undergraduate Jackie Zhou (Advisor: @mebenitez.bsky.social) was awarded the Outstanding Junior Award in Anthropology and participated in capuchin research at the Taboga forest reserve in Costa Rica.
Photo with Dr. Sarah Kovalaskas and her advisor, Dr Marcela Benítez, at her doctoral defense.
Dr. Sarah Kovalaskas with a celebratory cake after presenting her dissertation.
On April 18th, @sarahkovo.bsky.social (Advisor: @mebenitez.bsky.social) defended her doctoral dissertation “From Conflict to Cohesion: The effect of intergroup competition on affiliation, oxytocin, and group cohesion in wild capuchin monkeys.” We are so proud of all her amazing work!
Congrats Dr. Kovalaskas!
Happy New Year from the APE Lab! Wishing everyone a wonderful 2025 🐵 🥳
Interrupting your regularly scheduled program to wish you a Mora Christmas and a Feliz Navidog
Hi there! We are the Anthropology Primatology Lab at Emory. As a joint lab between Dr. Elizabeth Lonsdorf and @mebenitez.bsky.social, we study primate social behavior, cognition, health, & development. Check out our website at apes.emory.edu and follow along here to see our work and recent news! 🐵🧠📚
youtu.be/s7ylwHcSlv8
#primatesky #anthrosky #ecologysky
Proud of our grad student, Jordan Lucore, for her study out in Sci Advances: The immune performance of wild capuchin monkeys declines when they experience higher temperatures, with youngest monkeys the most vulnerable to heat. news.umich.edu/warming-temp...
🌡️🔥Check out our new Science Advances paper on how #ClimateChange impacts the immune performance of wild capuchins 🐒!
Lead by Jordan Lucore check out the full paper: www.science.org/doi/10.1126/...
Watch the explainer video: www.youtube.com/watch?v=s7yl...
A brown monkey with darker hair on its head has its back to us while it interacts with a large white box tied to a tree. Three other monkeys watch on. The landscape is dry scrub and conglomerate stones
New paper with the Serra da Capivara capuchins found they could learn an artificial task by watching closely, which in turn means being tolerated by other monkeys.
The authors, led by Camila Coelho, suggest that the same process supports tool use in these primates 🧪🐒
www.pnas.org/doi/10.1073/...
Social learning is triggered by environmental cues in immigrant birds | doi.org/10.1371/jour... | PLOS Biology | #ornithology 🪶
Gracias!!!
A Snapshot of Scientific Thought on Emotions in Animals.
Check out our recent survey of #animalbehavior researchers' perception of #animalemotions and consciousness.
royalsocietypublishing.org/doi/10.1098/...
news.emory.edu/features/202...
Hi! I’m Marcela Benítez (she/her)
#anthropologist 🧑🔬| #primatologst 🐒| #queerinstem🌈
•Co-director of Capuchinos de Taboga in Costa Rica 🇨🇷
•Director of SoCaP lab @Emory
•Broadly interested in social behavior 🤝, cognition 🧠, hormones & behavior 🧬, field experiments 🌴, queer animals 🌈🦍, soccer ⚽
