Abstract
Much of our current understanding of human prehension in a comparative context is based on macaque models in a sitting, constrained body posture. In a previous study, we clearly showed differences in the amplitude of the forelimb joints between five primate species (lemur, capuchin, chimpanzee, gorilla and human) during unconstrained grasping where the animals were free to choose their body posture. One of our interrogations was to know if these differences could be due to the body posture. To address this question, this study compares humans with new data for gorillas during an unconstrained food prehension task in two body postures, a sitting and a quadrupedal one. The objective is to determine the behavioral and kinematic strategies (amplitudes and patterns of evolution of the articular angles) as well as differences and invariants of trunk and forelimb motions between species. The subjects were recorded by five cameras, and landmarks were digitized frame by frame to reconstruct 3D movement. Our results show that (1) despite significant influences of body postures on ranges of motion in gorillas and humans, species preserve their specific forelimb joint and trunk contribution; (2) body posture has a limited effect on the basic pattern of wrist velocity. Our study indicates that different primate species have specific kinematic features of limb coordination during prehension, which dose not alter with changes in posture. Therefore, across varying species, it is possible to compare limb kinematics irrespective of postural constraints and unconstrained condition need to be explored in other primates to understand the evolution of primate prehension.
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Acknowledgments
This research was supported by a grant from the fondation “Marcel Bleustein Blanchet pour la vocation” and by the Action Transversale du Muséum National d’Histoire Naturelle (Paris, France) “Formes possibles, Formes réalisées.” We are especially grateful to the director of the zoo La Palmyre, Mr Caillé and the veterinary Mr Petit, who permitted us to conduct this study. We also wish to thank the staff of the Zoo, particularly Ronald Bosse, Redouane Lajali and Michel Carette, for their assistance during this study. We also thank Pauline Provini, Anthony Herrel, Antony Borel and Paul-Antoine Libourel for their help and relevant remarks.
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Reghem, E., Chèze, L., Coppens, Y. et al. The influence of body posture on the kinematics of prehension in humans and gorillas (Gorilla gorilla). Exp Brain Res 232, 1047–1056 (2014). https://doi.org/10.1007/s00221-013-3817-5
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s00221-013-3817-5