Pets Have Feelings Too! Book

The white-faced capuchins (Cebus capuchinus) are in many respects at the opposite end of the spectrum, both in terms of descent and behavior, to the muriqui monkeys I read about in my last book; the capuchins (there are at least seven other species) are the most similar of New World Monkeys to the general pattern of the Old World Monkeys in their social organization, with philopatric females and emigrating males, and a polygynous mating structure with a single dominant alpha male. They also have the largest brains relative to body size outside the apes; and this is one of the things that attracted Perry and her husband/co-author to study them, since they evolved large brain size independently of our direct lineage and therefore may cast some light on what ecological and behavioral factors led to our own large brains.

Her studies at Lomas Barbudal, in Costa Rica, are among the longest and most complete for any primate species, and were designed to investigate various aspects of the monkey's lives with special attention to various theoretical models of behavioral evolution and possible cultural differences (i.e. intra-species population differences due to social learning rather than genetics.) The book was extremely interesting.