title: Early experience affects the strength of vigilance for threat in rhesus monkey infants.
abstract: Both human and nonhuman primates exhibit a cognitive bias to social threat, but little is known about how this bias develops. We investigated the development of threat bias in free-ranging infant rhesus macaques (Macaca mulatta) at 3 months (n = 45) and 9 months (n = 46) of age. Three-month-olds did not display bias, but 9-month-olds exhibited increased maintenance of attention to threatening social stimuli. To examine whether the social environment affected this increased vigilance for threat, we collected behavioral data on maternal rank and protectiveness across the first 12 weeks of life for infants tested at 9 months. Among 9-month-olds, those of high-ranking and more protective mothers displayed greater vigilance for threat than those of lower-ranking and less protective mothers. These results demonstrate that infant social cognition is shaped by mothers both directly (via protectiveness) and indirectly (through social rank).
authors.affiliation: Institute for Mind and Biology, The University of Chicago Department of Comparative Human Development, The University of Chicago tmandalaywala@uchicago.edu.
authors.forename: Tara M
authors.initials: TM
authors.lastname: Mandalaywala
authors.affiliation: Department of Psychiatry and Behavioral Sciences, Stanford University School of Medicine.
authors.forename: Karen J
authors.initials: KJ
authors.lastname: Parker
authors.affiliation: Institute for Mind and Biology, The University of Chicago Department of Comparative Human Development, The University of Chicago.
authors.forename: Dario
authors.initials: D
authors.lastname: Maestripieri
mesh_terms: D000818:Animals; D001143:Arousal; D001522:Behavior, Animal; D003071:Cognition; D008253:Macaca mulatta; D008425:Maternal Behavior; D012919:Social Behavior; D012931:Social Environment; D012938:Social Perception
keywords: cognitive bias; maternal effects; primate; rhesus macaque; socio-cognitive development