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Hand Preferences in Different Tasks by Tufted Capuchins (Cebus apella)

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Abstract

We examined hand preferences in 25 tufted capuchins (Cebus apella) in three tasks. The hole task involved a single action of reaching for food in a hole. The horizontal panel and the vertical panel tasks required the alignment of two apertures, by moving or lifting a panel, to reach for food in a hole. We found a significant group-level right-hand preference for reaching actions in the hole and in the horizontal panel tasks, but not in the vertical panel task, in which the food retrieval implied the complementary use of both hands. No significant hand bias emerged for moving or lifting actions with high visuospatial components. There is a stronger hand preference in more complex manual activity—coordinated bimanual hand use for food retrieval—than in other unimanual measures. We discuss the results in the context of previous reports on primate laterality.

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  1. Reparto di Psicologia Comparata, Istituto di Psicologia, CNR, 00197, Rome, Italy

    Giovanna Spinozzi & Valentina Truppa

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  1. Giovanna Spinozzi
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  2. Valentina Truppa
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Correspondence to Giovanna Spinozzi.

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Spinozzi, G., Truppa, V. Hand Preferences in Different Tasks by Tufted Capuchins (Cebus apella). International Journal of Primatology 20, 827–849 (1999). https://doi.org/10.1023/A:1020870317124

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