Touch Screens Are Calming to Monkeys, Children of the World Unsurprised
You're not bribing your child with your smartphone; you're improving its social behavior.
At Markwell Wildlife, a group of crested macaques participates in cognitive tests that they interact with through touch screens, and it seems to positively affect their behavior. We wonder if their behavior would continue to be so positive if they were forced to pause mid-test to eat dinner or go do a sports thing.
Monkeys in captivity are often used for studying psychology due to their intelligence and ability to manipulate devices in much the same way as humans. In a study published on PLOS ONE, a research team at the University of Portsmouth found that when the macaques were allowed to choose to leave their social groups to participate in the touch screen testing and return at their leisure, it curbed fighting and led to stronger group bonding.
Of course, you don’t really love your smartphone as much as you enjoy the entertainment it provides, and the macaques are no different. It’s not so much the screen itself that calms them as it is the social dynamic of having a solo activity that they can sink some time into.
Taking the time to separate from the group allows them to calm down, and it gives the other members a chance to create more intimate bonds as the group gets temporarily smaller. Basically, the macaques really benefit from some alone time. Upon returning to their groups, those participating in the tests displayed friendly social behaviors that demonstrated they had missed their companions.
So, if you want to feel even worse about your smartphone addiction, not only can monkeys use touch screens, but they’re better than a lot of people at knowing when enough is enough and returning to a more social situation. Of course, we’d probably get tired of phone-time faster if the only apps we had were cognitive tests. Probably.
(via Phys.org and PLOS ONE, image via Willard)
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