JCP (Nov 2018)

This issue of JCP has a special section celebrating Machiavellian Intelligence. Review papers, and some papers on new thoughts about the role of MI for cognition, social behavior, etc. Nothing really jumped out at me.

Two other papers were notable:

Cheng, K., & Byrne, R. W. (2018). Why human environments enhance animal capacities to use objects: Evidence from keas (Nestor notabilis) and apes (Gorilla gorilla, Pan paniscus, Pongo abelii, Pongo pygmaeus). Journal of Comparative Psychology, 132(4), 419-426.

Worth reading because it speaks to individual differences. And, it says if you are an animal who is around humans, you do more interesting (to humans) kinds of things, like use tools. This is probably because you have free time (humans are taking care of you, in a lot of cases). Also, human activity leads to stimulus enhancement toward objects that humans use, and maybe even direct imitation or emulation. These idea obviously tie to others such as the role of enculturation on cognitive development.

One more:

Kret, M. E., Muramatsu, A., & Matsuzawa, T. (2018). Emotion processing across and within species: A comparison between humans (Homo sapiens) and chimpanzees (Pan troglodytes). Journal of Comparative Psychology, 132(4), 395-409.

Humans show a bias toward emotional stimuli (both chimp and human emotional faces), but chimpanzees show no such bias (for any species or type of visual stimuli). Perhaps this relates to theory of mind, or reflects early rearing, or social norms, or is much more foundational to affective system differences between humans and chimps.