Titi monkeys (Plecturocebus cupreus) are a pair-bonding South American monkey. Pair bonding is a psychological construct that includes showing a preference for a familiar partner, distress upon separation, and the ability of the partner to buffer their pair-mate against stressors. In the wild and in the lab, titi monkey pair-mates spend most of their time within sight of each other and a lot of it in physical contact with their tails twined.
In our lab, we use different non-invasive imaging techniques to examine the neurobiology of social bonding in this species. Some of our interests include:
- Social buffering and social isolation: how oxytocin and kappa opioid receptors interact in the context of separation and social buffering;
- Vocal and visual communication: how communication modalities allow for and interact with the formation and maintenance of pair bonds;
- Cognition: how cognition in titi monkeys changes as they form and maintain pair bonds over time and aging;
- Compatibility and pair bonding: how pairing monkeys based on compatibility can lead to an increase in post-pairing affiliation.
Titi monkey research is funded by NIMH (MH125411); the Good Nature Institute; the Dawn Grench Family Institute; and the Office of Research Infrastructure Programs (ORIP) of the National Institutes of Health through Award Number P51OD011107 to the California National Primate Research Center.