News

Bonobo Project II van start

Published 19 November 2015 | By Mariska Kret

Het is winter en de Apenheul is gesloten. Goed nieuws, want dat betekent dat we van start kunnen met Bonobo Project II! De resultaten van Bonobo Project I zijn opgeschreven en ingediend bij een wetenschappelijk tijdschrift. Ik zal de bevindingen binnenkort op mijn website zetten. Maar hier eerst een update over waar we nu staan! Jasper Wijnen heeft deze week… Read more »

Winner of the CoPAN photo competition

Published 10 November 2015 | By Mariska Kret

We hereby would like to announce the winner of the CoPAN photo competition….Hugh Jansman! Winning numbers 2 and 3 are Iris Kronenburg and Joke Kok. We received more than 5000 pictures in total and this made a great contribution to the stimulus material for the bonobo research that will start this winter again in de Apenheul with Master student and… Read more »

Primatologists in discussion. The Netherlands meets Japan.

Published 9 November 2015 | By Mariska Kret

• Insight in the evolution of human cognition can be obtained through research with apes. • Only humans have emotions. • In Japan, robots have a soul. These and more theses will be discussed by the Japanese and Dutch primatologists Tetsuro Matsuzawa and Jan van Hooff in the special ambience of the Leiden SieboldHuis. The discussion evening welcomes a broad… Read more »

Interview op radio 1

Published 5 November 2015 | By Mariska Kret

Interview met Felice van Nunspeet en Mariska Kret over het LIBC symposium “De wereld van het Sociale Brein”, over emoties, apen, bankiers en nog veel meer, hier terug te luisteren (en te zien). Lees hier meer over het LIBC publiekssymposium!… Read more »

EASP and KNAW fund my research on clinical applications regarding pupil mimicry

Published 24 September 2015 | By Mariska Kret

During close interactions, humans look into one another’s eyes, follow gaze, and quickly grasp emotion signals. The eye-catching morphology of human eyes, with unique eye whites, draws attention to the middle part, to the pupils, and their autonomic changes, which signal arousal, cognitive load, and social interest. Recently, an intriguing phenomenon has been discovered: humans tend to synchronize their pupil-size… Read more »

CoPAN Photo Competition

Published 22 September 2015 | By Mariska Kret

Theme: the social and emotional bonobo Prize: 200 euro For a new non-invasive experiment I am looking for pictures of bonobos from Apenheul (the Netherlands), Kölner Zoo (Germany) and Planckendael Zoo (Belgium) taken in 2014 or 2015 showing: Stress, display, yawns, sexual intercourse, grooming or emotional expressions Close-ups of the eye-region showing a neutral expression The pictures can… Read more »

CoPAN welcomes new PhD student Friederike Behrens!

Published 10 September 2015 | By Mariska Kret

Friederike will work on the research project “Emotional expressions beyond facial muscle actions.” Project description: Humans are well adapted to quickly recognize and adequately respond to another’s emotions. Different theories propose that mimicry of emotional expressions (facial or otherwise) mechanistically underlies, or at least facilitates, these swift adaptive reactions. When people unconsciously mimic their interaction partner’s expressions of emotion, they… Read more »

Cognition Behavior Evolution Network Conference 9-10 December 2015

Published 19 August 2015 | By Mariska Kret

CBEN announces her 2nd conference! The conference will be on December 9-10, 2015 at Ghent University (Belgium), and is this time organized by Eveline Seghers and Stefaan Blancke. Key note speaker will be Geoffrey Miller, the evolutionary psychologist who became famous with his book The Mating Mind. More information will be posted soon here. In addition to the CBEN… Read more »

Vacancy for PhD student in Cognitive Neuroscience

Published 14 July 2015 | By Mariska Kret

Research Project “Emotional expressions beyond facial muscle actions.” Humans are well adapted to quickly recognize and adequately respond to another’s emotions. Different theories propose that mimicry of emotional expressions (facial or otherwise) mechanistically underlies, or at least facilitates, these swift adaptive reactions. When people unconsciously mimic their interaction partner’s expressions of emotion, they come to feel reflections of those companions’… Read more »

NWO talent grant

Published 5 July 2015 | By Mariska Kret

Project “The Role of Pupil Synchronization in Real Life Interactions: Implications for Trust and Deception”. With Prof. C. de Dreu and RM student Eliska Prochazkova. Awarded four years full-time for a PhD student and €10.000 material costs.… Read more »