Inlaks RS Intern 2021: Rohit Negi
Rohit Negi is a 2021 Inlaks RS Intern. For his internship he studied the behavioural experimentation and phylogenetic analysis in captive and free ranging non-human primates at the Cognitive Ethology Lab, German Primate Centre (DPZ), Göttingen, Germany.
Read more about his experience in the post below.
An understanding of the behaviour of a species can inform its conservation-related management strategies. One of my primary goals is to educate myself in the field of animal behaviour, particularly primate behaviour, and contribute to the formulation of behaviour-based management strategies. As a step towards this goal, I interned at the Cognitive Ethology Lab, German Primate Centre (DPZ), Göttingen, Germany, where I studied the behaviour of long-tailed macaques (Macaca fascicularis) and Guinea baboons (Papio papio) at the DPZ.
I spent the first five months of my internship assisting with two projects pertaining to cognition of captive long-tailed macaques (LTM). I helped conduct a number of discrimination and delay-of-gratification exchange tasks. The discrimination task investigated if LTM can differentiate rewards that only differ on quantitative measures. Subjects were tested to discriminate between 1 versus 4 and 4 versus 7 grapes. I also coded and learned to use the software Solomon coder. As I already had some research experience with wild animals, the aforementioned experimental work helped me observe a contrast between the two systems i.e., captive vs wild. For example: in a captive setup a trusting relationship between the experimenter and the subjects is desirable, ergo, direct interactions become inevitable. Whereas in the wild, direct interactions with animals are generally avoided.
For the last part of my internship, I moved to Senegal, where I am now working as a research assistant studying wild Guinea baboons (GB). I am currently receiving training to observe and record GB’s behaviour. Once trained, I will contribute to long-term research on GB social behaviour and conservation at the Nikolo-Koba National Park, Simenti, Senegal.
Finally, I would like to thank the Inlaks and the IPS foundation for their continual support throughout this internship.
