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Using a Touchscreen Paradigm to Evaluate Food Preferences and Response to Novel Photographic Stimuli of Food in Three Primate Species (Gorilla gorilla gorilla, Pan troglodytes, and Macaca fuscata)

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A Correction to this article was published on 07 May 2020

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Abstract

Understanding captive animals’ preferences is important for their care and management. However, pairwise testing for preference can be time consuming, open to bias, and typically restricted to stimuli that can be presented manually. We tested the efficacy of using touchscreens to test zoo-housed primates’ food preferences and evaluated the primates’ understanding and interpretation of photographic stimuli. We showed 18 subjects (six gorillas, five chimpanzees, and seven Japanese macaques) four food stimuli (digital photographs of familiar foods presented via touchscreens) to test their preferences in a forced-choice paradigm. We presented preliminary single-food training trials before paired forced-choice test trials, which revealed subjects’ relative preferences for the four foods. To distinguish whether the primates’ responses represented conditioned associations between the stimuli and rewards, or a true understanding of the food photographs, we ran a follow-up study with novel stimuli (novel photographs of familiar foods). We combined the two novel stimuli with the four stimuli presented in the first experiment in pairwise forced-choice trials (importantly, without training trials). Subjects did not preferentially select or avoid the novel stimuli, suggesting they spontaneously interpreted the stimuli without training. While there was interindividual variation in preferences, subject choices were consistent across studies, even with the addition of novel stimuli. These results suggest that preferences for a variety of stimuli could be tested quickly, efficiently, and accurately using touchscreens.

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Change history

  • 07 May 2020

    In the original version of our methods, we incorrectly stated the size of the Japanese macaques’ exhibit at Lincoln Park Zoo.

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Acknowledgments

We thank the animal care staff at Lincoln Park Zoo’s Regenstein Center for African Apes and Regenstein Macaque Forest for the daily care for our subjects and their support of our research. We are grateful to Katie Cronin for her input regarding study design, particularly with the macaques, and for Mason Fidino for assistance with statistical analyses. We also thank two anonymous reviewers and the editor for their feedback on the manuscript. This study was funded by the Leo S. Guthman Fund; the Chauncey and Marion Deering McCormick Foundation; and, at the time of writing, L. M. H. was supported by the Women’s Board of Lincoln Park Zoo. This study was also supported (in part) by a grant from The David Bohnett Foundation.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Lester E. Fisher Center for the Study and Conservation of Apes, Lincoln Park Zoo, Chicago, IL, USA

    Sarah M. Huskisson, Sarah L. Jacobson, Crystal L. Egelkamp, Stephen R. Ross & Lydia M. Hopper

  2. Graduate Center, City University of New York, New York, NY, USA

    Sarah L. Jacobson

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  1. Sarah M. Huskisson
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  2. Sarah L. Jacobson
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  3. Crystal L. Egelkamp
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  4. Stephen R. Ross
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  5. Lydia M. Hopper
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Contributions

LMH conceived and designed the experiments. SMH, SLJ, and CLE performed the experiments. SMH and LMH analyzed the data. SMH wrote the manuscript; other authors provided editorial advice.

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Correspondence to Lydia M. Hopper.

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Handling Editor: Joanna M. Setchell

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Huskisson, S.M., Jacobson, S.L., Egelkamp, C.L. et al. Using a Touchscreen Paradigm to Evaluate Food Preferences and Response to Novel Photographic Stimuli of Food in Three Primate Species (Gorilla gorilla gorilla, Pan troglodytes, and Macaca fuscata). Int J Primatol 41, 5–23 (2020). https://doi.org/10.1007/s10764-020-00131-0

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