How do you keep a curious young captive Orangutan mentally and physically stimulated at the Zoo?
The answer is to provide her with behavioural enrichment. Many Zoos run Enrichment programmes that aim to enhance the quality of captive animal care by providing the environmental stimuli necessary for optimal psychological and physiological wellbeing through increasing the number of species-specific behaviours. Working with The National Zoo of Malaysia (Zoo Negara) and their enrichment program for Great Apes, Dr Neil Mennie, a neuroscientist in the Cognitive and Sensory Systems Research Group (CSS) in the School of Psychology at the University of Nottingham Malaysia Campus, has been awarded a grant worth RM216,000 from Malaysia’s Ministry of Science Technology and Innovation (MOSTI) to study the eye movements of a captive-born Sumatran Orangutan as she forages and searches for food in a specially adapted enclosure.
He is interested in how humans and apes use their brains to learn and make predictions about our surroundings when searching for objects in 3D spaces, and he records eye and body movements during the performance of complex actions. Not only will his work address vital questions about the visual cognition of humans and apes in natural tasks, but his work also provides valuable enrichment for the juvenile captive-born Orangutan called Tsunami that he works with.
Dr Mennie says “I’m interested in the way we make predictive eye movements to places in the world where the stimulus is yet to appear, and whether these predictive eye movements are there to assist the timing and placement of actions, or whether they also help high-level mechanisms such as memory for our immediate space and the location of objects within it. Orangutans are particularly interesting because to survive in the treetops they must be very spatially aware of their surroundings. I hope to investigate their ability to search for food and to compare their progress with humans in 3D search and foraging tasks.”
Dr Mennie has already been working with Tsunami and her keeper, Mohd Sharullizam Ramli, for the last year on a project that looks at her eye movements during different tasks such as locomotion and manipulation of small objects. Funding from the Malaysian Ministry of Higher Education (MOHE) helped that project, which was the first study to look at Orangutan eye movements in free ranging behaviour. MOHE has also assisted him with a grant on a project that looks at the predictive eye movements of humans when they play the Malaysian game Congkak.
Dr Mennie explains that his research on eye movements and actions in natural surroundings is not only relevant to the neuroscience of the visual brain, but also to research on active vision and the thrust to take computer vision from reactive to anticipatory systems. It’s also relevant to neuropsychological disorders such as Action Disorganisation Syndrome, and of course spatial memory. He says, “I’m also hoping that I can shed some light on how these endangered animals navigate and this might help other scientists who seek to conserve Orangutan habitat. Knowledge of their foraging and search behaviour may help in the design and conservation of forest corridors, for example.” For Tsunami and the other apes at Zoo Negara, it’s a valuable source of enrichment and play.
More information is available from Dr Neil Mennie at Neil.Mennie@nottingham.edu.my and you can also follow him on Twitter at @neil_me
About the Cognitive and Sensory Systems Research Group in the School of Psychology
Neuroscientists in the Cognition and Sensory Systems Research Group (CSS) are multidisciplinary, with a diverse range of interests. They have a broad range of experience within experimental psychology, neuroscience and computer science, and their emphasis is on experimentation and testing theory. They collaborate with each other and several international and Malaysian Researchers on different projects and supervise several postgraduate students who are interested in entering this field.
http://www.nottingham.edu.my/Psychology/Research/CognitiveandSensorySystemsGroup.aspx
About the School of Psychology
The School of Psychology opened at The University of Nottingham Malaysia Campus in September 2009.
Research areas within the school range from neuroimaging investigations of sensory integration and working memory; hazard perception in driving; impressions people believe members of other groups hold of one's own group (i.e. meta-stereotypes); evaluative research of alternative care for abandoned, orphaned, or otherwise displaced children; eye movements in complex actions; the cognitive aspects of social functioning in autism; face processing in individuals with developmental disorders and the perception of attractiveness and health.
Those who study with us are taught by field-leading experts and will have a diverse range of career choices.
The School offers two undergraduate degrees: BSc (Hons) Psychology & BSc (Hons) Psychology and Cognitive Neuroscience, as well as both MPhil and PhD graduate degrees. Applications are now being accepted for the September 2013 intake.
For more information, please consult www.nottingham.edu.my or email: enquiries@nottingham.edu.my (local students) international.enquiries@nottingham.edu.my (International students).
Notes to editors:
The University of Nottingham, described by The Sunday Times University Guide 2011 as ‘the embodiment of the modern international university’, has award-winning campuses in the United Kingdom, China and Malaysia. It is ranked in the UK's Top 10 and the World's Top 75 universities by the Shanghai Jiao Tong (SJTU) and the QS World University Rankings. It was named ‘Europe’s greenest university’ in the UI GreenMetric World University Ranking, a league table of the world’s most environmentally-friendly higher education institutions, which ranked Nottingham second in the world overall.
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More than 90 per cent of research at The University of Nottingham is of international quality, according to the most recent Research Assessment Exercise, with almost 60 per cent of all research defined as ‘world-leading’ or ‘internationally excellent’. cent of all research defined as ‘world-leading’ or ‘internationally excellent’. Research Fortnightanalysis of RAE 2008 ranked the University 7th in the UK by research power. The University’s vision is to be recognised around the world for its signature contributions, especially in global food security, energy & sustainability, and health.
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Posted on 8th November 2012