Within- and Between-Task Consistency in Hand Use as a Means of Characterizing Hand Preferences in Captive Chimpanzees (Pan troglodytes)

There remain considerable questions regarding the evidence for population-level handedness in nonhuman primates when compared with humans. One challenge in comparing human and nonhuman primate handedness involves the procedures used to characterize individual handedness. Studies of human handedness...

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Bibliographic Details
Published in:Journal of comparative psychology (1983) 2013-11, Vol.127 (4), p.380-391
Main Authors: Hopkins, William D, Gardner, Molly, Mingle, Morgan, Reamer, Lisa, Schapiro, Steven J
Format: Article
Language:English
Subjects:
Animal
Animal behavior
Animal cognition
Chimpanzees
Evolution
Evolutionary Psychology
Female
Handedness
Hands
Male
Motor Skills
Preferences
Primates
Primates (Nonhuman)
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Summary:There remain considerable questions regarding the evidence for population-level handedness in nonhuman primates when compared with humans. One challenge in comparing human and nonhuman primate handedness involves the procedures used to characterize individual handedness. Studies of human handedness use consistency in hand use within and between tasks as a basis for hand preference classification. In contrast, studies of handedness in nonhuman primates use statistical criteria for classifying handedness. In this study, we examined within- and between-task consistency in hand use as a means of characterizing individual handedness in a sample of 300 captive chimpanzees (Pan troglodytes). Chimpanzees showed population-level right-handedness for both within- and between-tasks consistency, though the proportion of right-handed chimpanzees was lower than what has typically been reported for humans. We further found that there were small, but significant, associations in hand use between measures. There were no significant sex or colony effects on the distribution of handedness. The results are discussed in the context of theories on the evolution of handedness in nonhuman primates.
ISSN:0735-7036
1939-2087
DOI:10.1037/a0031071