Published online by Cambridge University Press: 24 November 2009
Self-awareness has long been described as a capacity unique to, or perhaps defining, humans (Gallup, 1977b, 1983; Suarez & Gallup, 1981), and has been evaluated in numerous nonhuman species since the innovative studies of Gallup (1970). The ontogeny of self-recognition in human infants, that is, the acquisition of knowledge of one's physical appearance as a component of self-awareness, has also been explored by those with interests in human development, with most studies employing a variant of the Gallup (1970) mark test (Amsterdam, 1972; Bertenthal & Fischer, 1978; Brooks-Gunn & Lewis, 1984; Dixon, 1957; Papoušek & Papoušek, 1974). This test entails a surreptitiously applied mark (rouge placed on the child's nose) and attentional orientation to the mark as the dependent variable as the child views itself in a mirror. Similarly, self-recognition has been evaluated, principally through the use of the mark test, with a number of nonhuman primate species and elephants (see review by Anderson, 1984; Calhoun & Thompson, 1988; Gallup, 1970, 1977a,b, 1983, 1991, SAAH3; Gallup, Wallnau, & Suarez, 1980; Ledbetter & Basen, 1982; Lin, Bard, & Anderson, 1992; Povinelli, 1989; Robert, 1986; Suarez & Gallup, 1981; Swartz & Evans, 1991). Self-recognition, as one facet of self-awareness, has been demonstrated through the mirror mark test in chimpanzees (Gallup, 1970; Lin, Bard, & Anderson, 1992; Suarez & Gallup, 1981), and orangutans (Lethmate & Dücker, 1973), and the gorilla Koko (Patterson & Cohn, SAAH17).
To save this book to your Kindle, first ensure no-reply@cambridge.org is added to your Approved Personal Document E-mail List under your Personal Document Settings on the Manage Your Content and Devices page of your Amazon account. Then enter the ‘name’ part of your Kindle email address below. Find out more about saving to your Kindle.
Note you can select to save to either the @free.kindle.com or @kindle.com variations. ‘@free.kindle.com’ emails are free but can only be saved to your device when it is connected to wi-fi. ‘@kindle.com’ emails can be delivered even when you are not connected to wi-fi, but note that service fees apply.
Find out more about the Kindle Personal Document Service.
To save content items to your account, please confirm that you agree to abide by our usage policies. If this is the first time you use this feature, you will be asked to authorise Cambridge Core to connect with your account. Find out more about saving content to Dropbox.
To save content items to your account, please confirm that you agree to abide by our usage policies. If this is the first time you use this feature, you will be asked to authorise Cambridge Core to connect with your account. Find out more about saving content to Google Drive.