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Neal Webb S, Schapiro S. Locomotion as a Measure of Well-Being in Captive Chimpanzees ( Pan troglodytes). Animals (Basel) 2023; 13:ani13050803. [PMID: 36899659 PMCID: PMC10000181 DOI: 10.3390/ani13050803] [Citation(s) in RCA: 0] [Impact Index Per Article: 0] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Key Words] [Grants] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 01/09/2023] [Revised: 02/17/2023] [Accepted: 02/21/2023] [Indexed: 02/25/2023] Open
Abstract
Locomotion in non-human primates, including walking, climbing, and brachiating among other types of movement (but not pacing), is a species-typical behavior that varies with age, social housing conditions, and environmental factors (e.g., season, food availability, physical housing conditions). Given that captive primates are typically observed to engage in lower levels of locomotor behaviors than their wild counterparts, increases in locomotion are generally considered to be indicative of improved welfare in captivity. However, increases in locomotion do not always occur with improvements in welfare, and sometimes occur under conditions of negative arousal. The use of time spent in locomotion as a welfare indicator in studies of well-being is relatively limited. We conducted focal animal observations on 120 captive chimpanzees across a series of studies and found higher percentages of time spent in locomotion (1) upon transfer to a new enclosure type, (2) in larger groups with wider within-group age ranges, and fewer males, and (3) with participation in an experimental medication choice paradigm. We also found that, among geriatric chimpanzees, those housed in nongeriatric groups exhibited more locomotion than those living in geriatric groups. Lastly, locomotion was significantly negatively correlated with several indicators of poor welfare and significantly positively correlated with behavioral diversity, one indicator of positive welfare. Overall, the increases in time spent in locomotion observed in these studies were part of an overall behavioral pattern indicative of enhanced welfare, suggesting that an increase in time spent in locomotion itself may be an indicator of enhanced welfare. As such, we suggest that levels of locomotion, which are typically assessed in most behavioral experiments, may be used more explicitly as indicators of welfare in chimpanzees.
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Affiliation(s)
- Sarah Neal Webb
- Department of Comparative Medicine, Michale E. Keeling Center for Comparative Medicine and Research, The University of Texas MD Anderson Cancer Center, Houston, TX 78602, USA
- Correspondence:
| | - Steven Schapiro
- Department of Comparative Medicine, Michale E. Keeling Center for Comparative Medicine and Research, The University of Texas MD Anderson Cancer Center, Houston, TX 78602, USA
- Department of Experimental Medicine, The University of Copenhagen, Nørregade 10, 1165 Copenhagen, Denmark
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Brereton JE, Fernandez EJ. Investigating Unused Tools for the Animal Behavioral Diversity Toolkit. Animals (Basel) 2022; 12:2984. [PMID: 36359107 PMCID: PMC9654576 DOI: 10.3390/ani12212984] [Citation(s) in RCA: 3] [Impact Index Per Article: 1.5] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Key Words] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 10/03/2022] [Revised: 10/25/2022] [Accepted: 10/28/2022] [Indexed: 10/29/2023] Open
Abstract
Behavioral diversity is a commonly used tool used to quantify the richness and evenness of animal behaviors and assess the effect of variables that may impact an animal's quality of life. The indices used in behavioral diversity research, and the study subjects, have not been formally reviewed. This paper aims to identify which indices are being used in behavioral diversity research, and under which scenarios, and uncover novel indices from other disciplines that could be applied to behavioral diversity. To investigate the techniques and species investigated in behavioral diversity literature, a Web of Science literature search was conducted. Two methods: behavioral richness and the Shannon-Wiener index, were the most frequently used indices, whereas the Behavioral Variability index featured rarely. While a range of species appeared in the behavioral literature, mammals were the most frequently studied Class, whereas amphibians did not feature in any papers. There are several diversity indices which did not feature in behavioral diversity including Simpson's index, and Chao. Such indices could be used to better understand animal behavioral study outputs or be used to estimate the number of 'unobserved' behaviors that an animal may express. Future studies could therefore extend beyond the Shannon-Wiener and richness indices.
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Affiliation(s)
- James Edward Brereton
- Animal and Zoo Science, University Centre Sparsholt, Westley Lane, Sparsholt, Winchester SO21 2NF, UK
| | - Eduardo J. Fernandez
- School of Animal and Veterinary Sciences, The University of Adelaide, Adelaide, SA 5005, Australia
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Mulholland MM, Neal Webb SJ, Mareno MC, Schweller KG, Schapiro SJ, Hopkins WD. Are conspecific social videos rewarding to chimpanzees (Pan troglodytes)? A test of the social motivation theory. PLoS One 2021; 16:e0259941. [PMID: 34818358 PMCID: PMC8612576 DOI: 10.1371/journal.pone.0259941] [Citation(s) in RCA: 1] [Impact Index Per Article: 0.3] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [MESH Headings] [Grants] [Track Full Text] [Download PDF] [Figures] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 06/16/2020] [Accepted: 10/31/2021] [Indexed: 11/18/2022] Open
Abstract
Many claim that social stimuli are rewarding to primates, but few, if any, studies have explicitly demonstrated their reward value. Here, we examined whether chimpanzees would produce overt responses for the opportunity to view conspecific social, compared to dynamic (video: Experiment 1) and static (picture: Experiment 2) control content. We also explored the relationships between variation in social reward and social behavior and cognition. We provided captive chimpanzees with access to a touchscreen during four, one-hour sessions (two 'conspecific social' and two 'control'). The sessions consisted of ten, 15-second videos (or pictures in Experiment 2) of either chimpanzees engaging in a variety of behaviors (social condition) or vehicles, humans, or other animals engaged in some activity (control condition). For each chimpanzee, we recorded the number of responses to the touchscreen and the frequency of watching the stimuli. Independent t-tests revealed no sex or rearing differences in touching and watching the social or control videos (p>0.05). Repeated measures ANOVAs showed chimpanzees touched and watched the screen significantly more often during the social compared to control video sessions. Furthermore, although chimpanzees did not touch the screen more often during social than control picture sessions in Experiment 2, they did watch the screen more often. Additionally, chimpanzees that previously performed better on a task of social cognition and engaged in more affiliative behavior watched a higher percentage of social videos during the touchscreen task. These results are consistent with the social motivation theory, and indicate social stimuli are intrinsically rewarding, as chimpanzees made more overt responses for the opportunity to view conspecific social, compared to control, content.
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Affiliation(s)
- Michele M. Mulholland
- Department of Comparative Medicine, The University of Texas MD Anderson Cancer Center, Bastrop, TX, United States of America
- * E-mail:
| | - Sarah J. Neal Webb
- Department of Comparative Medicine, The University of Texas MD Anderson Cancer Center, Bastrop, TX, United States of America
| | - Mary Catherine Mareno
- Department of Comparative Medicine, The University of Texas MD Anderson Cancer Center, Bastrop, TX, United States of America
| | | | - Steven J. Schapiro
- Department of Comparative Medicine, The University of Texas MD Anderson Cancer Center, Bastrop, TX, United States of America
- Department of Experimental Medicine, University of Copenhagen, Storm Lake, IA, United States of America
| | - William D. Hopkins
- Department of Comparative Medicine, The University of Texas MD Anderson Cancer Center, Bastrop, TX, United States of America
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Schapiro SJ, Neal Webb SJ, Mulholland MM, Lambeth SP. Behavioral Management is a Key Component of Ethical Research. ILAR J 2021; 60:389-396. [PMID: 33434922 DOI: 10.1093/ilar/ilaa023] [Citation(s) in RCA: 0] [Impact Index Per Article: 0] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Key Words] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 04/02/2019] [Revised: 11/21/2019] [Accepted: 07/01/2020] [Indexed: 11/14/2022] Open
Abstract
Behavioral management programs aim to enhance the welfare of animal subjects that participate in research, thereby enhancing our ability to conduct ethical research projects. Socialization strategies, environmental enrichment techniques, opportunities for subjects to voluntarily participate in research procedures, and the provision of Functionally Appropriate Captive Environments are 4 major components of most behavioral management programs. The appropriate implementation of behavioral management programs should provide animals with opportunities to engage in species-typical activity patterns, contributing to valid and reliable animal models that require the smallest number of subjects to achieve meaningful results. The role that socialization strategies, environmental enrichment techniques, and positive reinforcement training can play in maintaining and enhancing welfare through the stimulation of species-typical behavior and the prevention of abnormal behavior is discussed. The value of empirically assessing the effects of behavioral management techniques is emphasized. Additionally, the necessity of adjusting the relative prioritization of needs related to the convenience of human caregivers and the animals themselves is addressed. For the purposes of this discussion, research projects are considered to be ethical if they (1) involve animals with high welfare, (2) provide data that are reliable and valid, (3) involve appropriate numbers of subjects, and (4) involve animals that are appropriate models to test meaningful hypotheses.
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Affiliation(s)
- Steven J Schapiro
- Department of Comparative Medicine, The University of Texas MD Anderson Cancer Center, Bastrop, Texas, USA.,Department of Experimental Medicine, University of Copenhagen, Copenhagen, Denmark
| | - Sarah J Neal Webb
- Department of Comparative Medicine, The University of Texas MD Anderson Cancer Center, Bastrop, Texas, USA.,Department of Experimental Medicine, University of Copenhagen, Copenhagen, Denmark
| | - Michele M Mulholland
- Department of Comparative Medicine, The University of Texas MD Anderson Cancer Center, Bastrop, Texas, USA.,Center for Behavioral Neuroscience, Georgia State University, Atlanta, Georgia, USA
| | - Susan P Lambeth
- Department of Comparative Medicine, The University of Texas MD Anderson Cancer Center, Bastrop, Texas, USA
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Mulholland MM, Sherwood CC, Schapiro SJ, Raghanti MA, Hopkins WD. Age- and cognition-related differences in the gray matter volume of the chimpanzee brain (Pan troglodytes): A voxel-based morphometry and conjunction analysis. Am J Primatol 2021; 83:e23264. [PMID: 33899958 DOI: 10.1002/ajp.23264] [Citation(s) in RCA: 3] [Impact Index Per Article: 1.0] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Key Words] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 12/02/2020] [Revised: 03/29/2021] [Accepted: 04/10/2021] [Indexed: 01/01/2023]
Abstract
Several primate species have been shown to exhibit age-related changes in cognition, brain, and behavior. However, severe neurodegenerative illnesses, such as Alzheimer's disease (AD), were once thought to be uniquely human. Recently, some chimpanzees naturally were documented to develop both neurofibrillary tangles and amyloid plaques, the main characteristics of AD pathology. In addition, like humans and other primates, chimpanzees show similar declines in cognition and motor function with age. Here, we used voxel-based morphometry to examine the relationships among gray matter volume, age, and cognition using magnetic resonance imaging scans previously acquired from chimpanzees (N = 216). We first determined the relationship between age and gray matter volume, identifying the regions that declined with age. With a subset of our sample (N = 103), we also determined differences in gray matter volume between older chimpanzees with higher cognition scores than expected for their age, and older chimpanzees with lower than expected scores. Finally, we ran a conjunction analysis to determine any overlap in brain regions between these two analyses. We found that as chimpanzees age, they lose gray matter in regions associated with cognition. In addition, cognitively healthy older chimpanzees (those performing better for their age) have greater gray matter volume in many brain regions compared with chimpanzees who underperform for their age. Finally, the conjunction analysis revealed that regions of age-related decline overlap with the regions that differ between cognitively healthy chimpanzees and those who underperform. This study provides further evidence that chimpanzees are an important model for research on the neurobiology of aging. Future studies should investigate the effects of cognitive stimulation on both cognitive performance and brain structure in aging nonhuman primates.
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Affiliation(s)
- Michele M Mulholland
- Department of Comparative Medicine, The University of Texas MD Anderson Cancer Center, Bastrop, Texas, USA
| | - Chet C Sherwood
- Department of Anthropology, Center for the Advanced Study of Human Paleobiology, The George Washington University, Washington DC, USA
| | - Steven J Schapiro
- Department of Comparative Medicine, The University of Texas MD Anderson Cancer Center, Bastrop, Texas, USA.,Department of Experimental Medicine, University of Copenhagen, Copenhagen, Denmark
| | | | - William D Hopkins
- Department of Comparative Medicine, The University of Texas MD Anderson Cancer Center, Bastrop, Texas, USA
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Effects of relocation on immunological and physiological measures in female squirrel monkeys (Saimiri boliviensis boliviensis). PLoS One 2021; 16:e0240705. [PMID: 33635869 PMCID: PMC7909711 DOI: 10.1371/journal.pone.0240705] [Citation(s) in RCA: 1] [Impact Index Per Article: 0.3] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Track Full Text] [Download PDF] [Figures] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 09/29/2020] [Accepted: 02/03/2021] [Indexed: 11/29/2022] Open
Abstract
In the present study, we have quantified the effects of transport, relocation and acclimate/adapt to their new surroundings on female squirrel monkey. These responses are measured in blood samples obtained from squirrel monkeys, at different time points relative to their relocation from their old home to their new home. A group of squirrel monkeys we transported, by truck, for approximately 10 hours. Peripheral blood mononuclear cells (PBMCs) were assayed in order to evaluate the phenotype of lymphocyte subsets by flow, mitogen-specific immune responses of PBMCs in vitro, and levels of cytokines at various time points including immediately before transport, immediately upon arrival, and after approximately 150 days of acclimation. We observed significant changes in T cells and subsets, NK and B cells (CD4+, CD8+, CD4+/CD8+, CD16+, and CD20+). Mitogen specific (e.g. PHA, PWM and LPS) proliferation responses, IFN-γ by ELISPOT assay, and cytokines (IL-2, IL-4 and VEGF) significant changes were observed. Changes seen in the serum chemistry measurements mostly complement those seen in the hematology data. The specific goal was to empirically assess the effects of relocation stress in squirrel monkeys in terms of changes in the numbers and functions of various leukocyte subsets in the blood and the amount of time required for acclimating to their new environment. Such data will help to determine when newly arrived animals become available for use in research studies.
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Pelé M, Georges JY, Matsuzawa T, Sueur C. Editorial: Perceptions of Human-Animal Relationships and Their Impacts on Animal Ethics, Law and Research. Front Psychol 2021; 11:631238. [PMID: 33469440 PMCID: PMC7813984 DOI: 10.3389/fpsyg.2020.631238] [Citation(s) in RCA: 2] [Impact Index Per Article: 0.7] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Key Words] [Track Full Text] [Download PDF] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 11/19/2020] [Accepted: 12/03/2020] [Indexed: 11/13/2022] Open
Affiliation(s)
- Marie Pelé
- Anthropo-Lab, ETHICS EA7446, Lille Catholic University, Lille, France
| | | | | | - Cédric Sueur
- Université de Strasbourg, CNRS, IPHC UMR 7178, Strasbourg, France.,Centre Européen d'Enseignement et de recherche en Éthique, Strasbourg, France.,Institut Universitaire de France, Paris, France
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