July 2005
Volume 18, Number 7
Monkey Money
Capuchin monkeys were wheeling and dealing with researchers during a recent study at Yale University that tested their behavior in economic trade situations. The monkeys, under the supervision of Kevin Chen and Laurie Santos, were given the option of swapping tokens for food with one of two researchers during daily trading sessions.
Initially, monkeys were shown the food prior to the trade. They later added two additional monkeys and often altered the amount of food after the decision had been made. This added the risk of losing a portion of the food to simulate investment-type situations.
Although the monkeys were obviously utilizing the trade system, their understanding of the value of money was still in question. However, after, they were shown to weigh their options, and most notably avert loss when faced with risky opportunities, the Capuchins had indeed grasped the value of the tokens.
Santos said this trading extended "beyond tokens to novel objects, but they never seem to [extend] the trading game to trading with each other." Although they did not trade with the other monkeys, The New York Times reported on June 5 that during the experiment, one of the subjects stole several coins from the trading area, and another was later observed trading sex for the tokens.
While the small brain of the Capuchin is most often occupied by nothing more than food, their behavior is very similar to that of humans. As Santos noted, "people don’t like to experience short-term losses" and avert risk much like the Capuchins. Also, "like humans in classic psychology studies, our Capuchins get caught up in how a particular problem is framed," depending on reference as an element in their decision. The results demonstrate that monkeys share more than just a resemblance, but similar thought processes and reference-dependency to humans in making risky economic decisions.
