CICASP | Center for International Collaboration and Advanced Studies in Primatology

Research

My main interests are in animal psychology and animal welfare. My research focuses on understanding how non-human primates perceive faces and facial expressions using computer-based tasks (e.g., matching-to-sample, dot probe and visual search). I am also interested in whether facial expressions can be used to assess emotional and welfare states in animals. I lecture on Comparative Psychology, Primate Behaviour and Cognition, and Science Communication at the Institute for Liberal Arts and Sciences, Kyoto University.

Background

Doctor of Science in Comparative Cognition

Graduate School of Science, Kyoto University (2015-2019)

Master of Science in Applied Animal Behaviour and Animal Welfare

Royal (Dick) School of Veterinary Studies, University of Edinburgh (2012-2013)

Bachelor of Science (Hons) in Psychology

Department of Psychology, University of Hull (2000-2003)

Current Projects

JSPS Grant-in-Aid for Research Activity Start-up (2021-2023)

Project: Geometric morphometrics for the study of facial expression of pain in common marmosets

Kyoto University Research Fund for Young Scientists (Start-Up) (2021-2021)

Project: Geometric morphometrics for the study of facial expression of pain in common marmosets

JSPS Grant-in-Aid for Research Fellows (2020-2021)

Project: A novel method to assess pain in common marmosets using facial expressions

JSPS Grant-in-Aid for Research Activity Start-up (2018-2020)

Project: Comparing emotional attention in humans and chimpanzees: Is the touchscreen dot probe task an effective tool?

MEXT Postgraduate Scholarship (2015-2018)

Project: Exploring attentional bias towards threatening faces in chimpanzees

Selected Publications

  Caeiro, C. C., Burrows, A., Wilson, D. A., Abdelrahman, A., Miyabe-Nishiwaki, T. (2022). CalliFACS: The common marmoset Facial Action Coding System. PLoS ONE 17(5): e026644. doi: 10.1371/journal.pone.0266442

Wilson, D. A., Tomonaga, M. (2022). Search asymmetries for threatening faces in chimpanzees (Pan troglodytes). Journal of Comparative Psychology, 136, 1, 20-34. doi: 10.1037/com0000302

Wilson, D. A., Tomonaga, M. (2018). Exploring attentional bias towards threatening faces in chimpanzees using the dot probe task. PLoS ONE 13(11): e0207378. doi: 10.1371/journal.pone.0207378

Wilson, D. A., Tomonaga, M. (2018). Visual discrimination of primate species based on faces in chimpanzees. Primates. 59, 3, 243-251. doi: 10.1007/s10329-018-0649-8

Wilson, D. A., Tomonaga, M., Vick, S-J. (2016). Eye preferences in capuchin monkeys (Sapajus apella). Primates, 57, 3, 433-440. doi: 10.1007/s10329-016-0537-z

Tlauka, M., Donaldson, P., Wilson, D. (2008). Forgetting in spatial memories acquired in a virtual environment. Applied Cognitive Psychology, 22, 1, 69-84. doi: 10.1002/acp.1341

Wilson, P. N., Wilson, D. A., Griffiths, L., Fox, S. (2007). First-perspective spatial alignment effects from real-world exploration. Memory & Cognition, 35, 1432-1444. doi: 10.3758/BF03193613

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