anhinga_anhinga: (Default)
anhinga_anhinga ([personal profile] anhinga_anhinga) wrote2006-01-07 11:29 pm

Male monkeys prefer toy cars, females like dolls

Something seems wrong strange with this.

from http://www.azstarnet.com/sn/printDS/108552

The differences apparently date far back in evolutionary history to the time before humans and monkeys separated from their common ancestor some 25 million years ago, according to Gerianne Alexander, a psychologist at Texas A&M University in College Station, who led the experiment.

"Human evolution has created two different types of brains designed for equally intelligent behavior," Richard Haier, a neuroscientist at the University of California-Irvine, wrote in the journal NeuroImage.

Variety of toys used

In the monkey experiment, researchers put a variety of toys in front of 44 male and 44 female vervets, a breed of small African monkeys, and measured the amount of time they spent with each object.

Like little boys, some male monkeys moved a toy car along the ground. Like little girls, female monkeys closely inspected a doll's bottom. Males also played with balls while females fancied cooking pots. Both were equally interested in neutral objects such as a picture book and a stuffed dog.

People used to think that boys and girls played differently because of the way they were brought up. Now scientists such as Alexander say a creature's genetic inheritance also plays an important role.

"Vervet monkeys, like human beings, show sex differences in toy preferences," Alexander wrote in the journal Evolution and Human Behavior. "Sex-related object preference appeared early in human evolution," she said.

Alexander speculated that females of both species prefer dolls because evolution programmed them to care for infants. Males may have evolved toy preferences that involve throwing and moving, skills useful for hunting and finding a mate.


What seems wrong strange is how the statement that female monkeys fancied cooking pots might fit into this evolutionary speculation... hmmm... hmmm...

Upd: probably this was because the cooking pots were red, and the authors of the paper decided to spin their conclusions somewhat.

female monkeys like cooking?

[identity profile] misha-b.livejournal.com 2006-01-08 05:27 am (UTC)(link)
Very suspicious as, indeed, many evolutionary explanations are.
It seems that anything can be explained by a sufficiently convoluted
evlutionary argument. Perhaps a case of reification.

Elementary, my dead Watson

[identity profile] spamsink.livejournal.com 2006-01-08 06:26 am (UTC)(link)
For the monkeys there were not cooking pots, but rather gatherer's containers, as opposed to the balls that were hunter's projectiles.

Re: Elementary, my dead Watson

[identity profile] anhinga-anhinga.livejournal.com 2006-01-08 03:56 pm (UTC)(link)
It's a possible conjecture. I am not sure, however, that these monkeys know how to use gathering containers (or projectiles for that matter --- they are not apes). But this is possible...

"Like most other members of the Cercopithecoidea superfamily, they have cheek pouches for storing food."

P.S. poor Watson

Re: Elementary, my dead Watson

[identity profile] spamsink.livejournal.com 2006-01-08 05:46 pm (UTC)(link)
The experimenters should have used toys without predefined functionality to avoid skewing the perception of the results.

PS. A slip of a finger, and dear becomes dead.

Re: Elementary, my dead Watson

[identity profile] faceless-lady.livejournal.com 2006-01-08 05:53 pm (UTC)(link)
вот и я говорю - в защёчные мешки собирают, а не во внешние контейнеры. ;-)

наличие такого мешка вряд ли развивает операционное мышление (в термине не уверена - придуман на ходу) :-)

Yes!

[identity profile] faceless-lady.livejournal.com - 2006-01-08 18:32 (UTC) - Expand

Re: Yes!

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Re: Yes!

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Re: Yes!

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Re: Yes!

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[identity profile] cema.livejournal.com 2006-01-08 06:37 am (UTC)(link)
"Males also played with balls", because they had them, unlike the females, who were just babies anyway, right?

[identity profile] ygam.livejournal.com 2006-01-08 10:54 pm (UTC)(link)
When I was growing up we were so poor that if I hadn't been a boy, I would have had nothing to play with.

[identity profile] cema.livejournal.com 2006-01-14 12:45 am (UTC)(link)
Right! I could not remember that quote.

[identity profile] faceless-lady.livejournal.com 2006-01-08 07:05 am (UTC)(link)
конечно, конечно... про кастрюльки - полная ахинея...или, иначе, наглая брехня.
Стараюсь такие "исследования" не принимать близко к сердцу. :-)

У меня было много кукол в детстве, но единственное, что я с ними делала - это вскрывала им чрева и изучала внутренности (если они были). А уж с кукольной посудой вообще никогда не знала что делать...другое дело - солдатики...много, целые армии...и танки с самолётами. А самые любимые игрушки - оружие..чем настоящее, тем лучше.И лучшие игры - бегать с этим оружием по лесу, прятаться, выслеживать etc...Вот вам и охотничий инстинкт.

[identity profile] cema.livejournal.com 2006-01-08 08:52 am (UTC)(link)
Про кастрюльки [livejournal.com profile] spamsink разумно сказал.

[identity profile] faceless-lady.livejournal.com 2006-01-08 03:58 pm (UTC)(link)
и что ж он разумного сказал? Основываясь на явно недобросовестно добытом факте (в противном случае, автор эксперимента не должен был называть это cooking pots, а сам бы назвал gatherer's containers, если он не полный... ;-) ), [livejournal.com profile] spamsink попробовал придумать объяснение, но, признаться, оно не звучит убедительно....почему-то кажется, что в древние времена самкам не приходилось больше иметь дела с контейнерами, чем самцам. Ягоды собирали не в контейнеры (кто эту глупость вообще придумал?!), а в рот....и тут же съедали. :-) Времена были тяжёлые, понимаете ли..

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[identity profile] neurosurg.livejournal.com 2006-01-08 11:09 am (UTC)(link)
как обстоят дела с парковкой машин?

а с левро/право?

и наверняка вам легко удаётся то, что мужчиные делают чаще с трудом: гладко говорить и одновременно при этом что-то еще очень хорошо делать. или?

[identity profile] faceless-lady.livejournal.com 2006-01-08 03:41 pm (UTC)(link)
С парковкой и лево/право проблем пока и в самом деле не было.

А вот горить и делать что-то ещё одновременно...даже хотя бы думать - совершенно невозможно. Вся семья ржет, насколько у меня отключается речевой процессор, когда делаю что-то, например, руками. В этом смысле, я не только не Цезарь, но даже отличаюсь от большинства людей. "На автомате" ничего не получается.

Кстати 1. Разве лево/право - это не общемужская проблема?

Кстати 2. А что это я тут разоткровенничалась? Ну, разве что...ради науки :-)

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nice article, URL was looked for2 a long time, thx

[identity profile] neurosurg.livejournal.com 2006-01-08 10:16 am (UTC)(link)
first facts, then interpretations. 1 could question the interpretations in this case, but the difference in prefs seems to be well seen.

p.s. btw, i was nearly attacked by my german colleagues, as i said that IMHO, sex-based behavioral prefs clearly exist.

Уточните , если не затруднит.

[identity profile] faceless-lady.livejournal.com 2006-01-08 03:48 pm (UTC)(link)
as i said that IMHO, sex-based behavioral prefs clearly exist

оно в какой момент(период)появляется и в результате чего: просто с момента задания пола и далее мозг развивается каким-то особым образом или специалтзация мозга производится искусственно, в процессе воспитания и обучения?
Во втором случае, существование такого различия очевидно и объясняется банально.

Re: Уточните , если не затруднит.

[identity profile] neurosurg.livejournal.com 2006-01-08 10:13 pm (UTC)(link)
конечно социум вносит свои корректуры, но убеждён, что многие особенности поведения предопределены а приори и в частности объясняются полом.

в детском саду девочки очень редко играют с машинками, а мальчики редко зависают у зеркала. убедить ребёнка играть с нелюбимой игрушкой -- нелепица.

Eurika! :-)

[identity profile] http://users.livejournal.com/_rowan_tree_/ 2006-01-08 11:41 pm (UTC)(link)
It's the other way around: cooking pots were developed in a shape more appealing to females.

But I still think it's some sort of nonsense. Did you notice where this articles is published? One journalist can do more damage to science than a hundred monkeys to "War and Peace" :-)))

Re: Eurika! :-)

[identity profile] anhinga-anhinga.livejournal.com 2006-01-09 12:01 am (UTC)(link)
!!!

> Did you notice where this articles is published?

In a newspaper, by a syndicated columnist (Robert S. Boyd actually). The Seattle Times also has it.

Re: Eurika! :-)

[identity profile] http://users.livejournal.com/_rowan_tree_/ 2006-01-09 12:07 am (UTC)(link)
In a newspaper, by a syndicated columnist - ever heard that journalists don't care to understand the results very well, are not at all good at conveying them to the public, and are after sensations? Did you read the original article? I think cooking pots could very easily be any other containers or devices. Or it could be that monkeys have been given videotapes of TV shows. Or that it wasn't monkeys in the study at all :-))

Re: Eurika! :-)

[identity profile] http://users.livejournal.com/_rowan_tree_/ 2006-01-09 12:23 am (UTC)(link)
Yeah, her description of current research doesn't seem to fit the described project:

"Currently, we are investigating the effects of social-emotional context on gender-linked spatial cognition using eye-tracking methodology and measuring these effects in women and men, between menstrual cycle phases, and between groups with high or low mood complaints."

This is the other way around: influence of social factors, not of genetics!

Re: Eurika! :-)

[identity profile] faceless-lady.livejournal.com 2006-01-09 12:28 am (UTC)(link)
cooking pots were developed in a shape more appealing to females.

Хочется надеяться, что Вы пошутили. :-)))

Re: Eurika! :-)

[identity profile] http://users.livejournal.com/_rowan_tree_/ 2006-01-09 12:34 am (UTC)(link)
В достаточной мере :-))
Из двух возможных объяснений (если бы "результаты" вызывали достаточно доверия, чтобы их надо было объяснять) это мне кажется более вероятным. Хотя всерьез, как сказано выше, подозреваю, что в обработке журналистов научные результаты несколько изменились.

[identity profile] dmierkin.livejournal.com 2006-01-09 07:05 pm (UTC)(link)
а потом окажется что девочки отражение своё рассматривали. торопятся исследователи очень.

я тебе не рассказывал про похожий эксперимент с моими детками ?

[identity profile] anhinga-anhinga.livejournal.com 2006-01-09 07:09 pm (UTC)(link)
> я тебе не рассказывал про похожий эксперимент с моими детками ?

нет :-)

расскажи...

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