Neonatal imitation in Rhesus Macaques
Open accessAbstract
The emergence of social behaviors early in life is likely crucial for the development of mother-infant relationships. Some of these behaviors, such as the capacity of neonates to imitate adult facial movements, were previously thought to be limited to humans and perhaps the ape lineage. Here we report the behavioral responses of infant rhesus macaques (Macaca mulatta) to the following human facial and hand gestures: lip smacking, tongue protrusion, mouth opening, hand opening, and opening and closing of eyes (control condition). In the third day of life, infant macaques imitate lip smacking and tongue protrusion. On the first day of life, the model's mouth openings elicited a similar matched behavior (lip smacking) in the infants. These imitative responses are present at an early stage of development, but they are apparently confined to a narrow temporal window. Because lip smacking is a core gesture in face-to-face interactions in macaques, neonatal imitation may serve to tune infants' affiliative responses to the social world. Our findings provide a quantitative description of neonatal imitation in a nonhuman primate species and suggest that these imitative capacities, contrary to what was previously thought, are not unique to the ape and human lineage. We suggest that their evolutionary origins may be traced to affiliative gestures with communicative functions.
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Rhesus macaques display basic aspects of complex social behaviors typically considered uniquely human, including social imitation, prosocial behaviors, and understanding others' perceptions.
“Critically, rhesus macaques display basic aspects of complex social behaviors that are typically considered ‘uniquely human’ (Frith and Frith, 2007; Saxe, 2006). These include social imitation (Ferrari et al., 2006; Subiaul, 2004), prosocial behaviors (Chang et al., 2011; Masserman et al., 1964), as well as understanding others’ perceptions (Flombaum and Santos, 2005; Santos et al., 2006).”
From Oxytocin and social cognition in rhesus macaques: Implications for understanding and treating human psychopathology (2014) · cites this paper as Ferrari et al., 2006
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- Authors
- Ferrari, P. F., Visalberghi, E., Paukner, A., Fogassi, L., Ruggiero, A., & Suomi, S. J.
- Affiliations
- University of Parma (IT)
- National Research Council (IT)
- National Institutes of Health (US)
- Corresponding author
- Ferrari, Pier F
- Venue
- PLoS Biology
- Publisher
- Public Library of Science (PLoS)
- Published
- 2006-09-05
- Volume
- 4
- Issue
- 9
- Pages
- e302
- ISSN
- 1544-9173 (ISSN-L)
- 1545-7885
- PMC
- PMC1560174
- OpenAlex
- W2132307087
- Cited by
- 354
- References
- 49
- Citations by year
- 2026: 15 · 2025: 8 · 2024: 12 · 2023: 6 · 2022: 8 · 2021: 12 · 2020: 7 · 2019: 13 · 2018: 12 · 2017: 19 · 2016: 25 · 2015: 22 · 2014: 24 · 2013: 30 · 2012: 20
- FWCI
- 35.81
- Type
- journal article
- Language
- en
- Open access
- gold
- doi.org
- Licence
- Locations
- PLoS Biology (publishedVersion, public-domain)
- Europe PMC (PubMed Central) (publishedVersion, public-domain)
- PubMed (publishedVersion)
- Nottingham Trent University's Institutional Repository (Nottingham Trent Repository) (acceptedVersion)
- DOAJ (DOAJ: Directory of Open Access Journals) (submittedVersion, cc-by-sa)
- Figshare (submittedVersion, cc-by)
- Funders
- National Institutes of Health
- National Institute of Child Health and Human Development
- NHLBI Division of Intramural Research
- Topics
- Social Sciences › Psychology › Social Psychology › Primate Behavior and Ecology
- Social Sciences › Psychology › Developmental and Educational Psychology › Child and Animal Learning Development
- Life Sciences › Neuroscience › Cognitive Neuroscience › Face Recognition and Perception
- Keywords
- neonatal imitation, rhesus monkeys, facial gestures, tongue protrusion, mother-infant relationship, affiliative behavior, social behavior development
- MeSH terms
- Animals, Animals, Newborn, Behavior, Animal, Facial Expression, Female, Imitative Behavior, Macaca mulatta, Male, Maternal Behavior, Mouth, Nonverbal Communication, Social Behavior, Time Factors, Tongue
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