Mirror‐image responses in pygmy marmosets (Cebuella pygmaea)

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Abstract
Only a few nonhuman species (chimpanzees and orangutans) have displayed mirror‐image recognition of themselves by grooming at a spot that can only be seen with the mirror. Pygmy marmosets have never been observed to self‐groom, but they do behave toward mirrors in a manner suggestive of the early stages of mirror‐image recognition. They displayed a rapid extinction of social threat responses to their own image and of novelty responses to mirrors, but continued to show mirror‐specific responses such as following their own image, playing peek‐a‐boo, and looking at their image throughout a 28‐day period of mirror exposure. The pygmy marmosets used a mirror to locate otherwise unseen conspecifics from other groups and directed threat responses toward the real location of these animals rather than to their mirror‐image. Pygmy marmosets displayed the precursor behaviors to mirror‐image recognition.