Primates

Journal Article Summary
 
Many primatologists study primate behavior. They are interested in what animals do (i.e. how they protect themselves against predators, decisions they make about who to groom and when, etc.), as well as why they do it (i.e. what selection pressures influence behavioral decisions animals make or why they show particular patterns of behavior).
 
For this assignment, your task is to find a recent (within the past 10 years) article from a peer-reviewed journal about primate behavior and write a short summary (in paragraph format) including the information below. The assignment should be no more than two pages (double-spaced, 12-pt font) in length.
 
In the paper, you will demonstrate how multiple disciplines simultaneously inform a question or issue by addressing how the interplay among disciplines has produced a holistic synthesis of the research and how this approach has led to new paradigms or ways of looking at things.
 
The anthropological approach tends to ask questions about the selective pressures that shaped our own species. Primatologists in this discipline tend to establish long-term study sites, and make connections between primate behavior and the environment with an aim to better understand ourselves through a better understanding of our closest living relatives. Within anthropology, primates are studied within the subfield of evolutionary anthropology.
 
The psychological approach tends to ask questions about the primate brain and cognition, with the ultimate goal of using this comparative approach to generate a greater understanding of human brain and behavioral processes. Primatologists in this discipline tend to emphasize controlled lab experiments. Within psychology, primates can be studied within cognitive psychology, developmental psychology, comparative psychology, evolutionary psychology, or neuroscience.
 
The biological approach tends to ask questions about how primates function. Primatologists in this discipline are interested in the evolutionary pressures that shaped primate taxonomy, and situate this within the context of the Class Mammalia. They tend to focus on field work to better understand how primates fit into greater community ecology. Within biology, primates can be studied under zoology, ethology, ecology, evolutionary biology, integrative biology, or organismal biology.
 
The modern field of primatology draws upon all three of these major approaches to generate a more complete picture of primate behavior, ecology, and evolution. These three perspectives allow researchers to discover emergent phenomenon that might otherwise have been missed by any single approach.
 
For your assignment, please provide full bibliographic information for your article of choice using APA format. This information should be at the top of the page and not part of the summary.
 
The body of the assignment should include:
1.     A short, one-paragraph, summary of the study, including information like:
a.     What was the goal/objective of the research being discussed?
b.     What primate species/taxa were used to try to answer the question? And where was the work done (e.g., wild, captivity, country)?
c.     What aspects of behavior were the researchers addressing (e.g., social behavior, foraging behavior, vocalizations)?
d.     Briefly summarize what data were collected and how, as well as the results/findings of the study.
2.     Two things that you liked about the article and why.
3.     One thing that you didn’t like and wish the authors had done better and why.
4.     How multiple disciplines informed the research (e.g., if there was an article on chimpanzee tool use that examined cognitive, social and ecological aspects of the behavior as well as how this behavior helps us to better understand ourselves, then you might talk about how this study had been informed by the three approaches.)
5.     One research question to pursue in the future.
 
Some good journals to look in are:
                International Journal of Primatology
                American Journal of Primatology
                Folia Primatologica
                Primates
                Animal Behaviour
                Behavioral Ecology
                Behavioral Ecology and Sociobiology