Data Exercise: Module 7

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Data Exercise Instructions:

Last week you learned how to collect behavioral data for primates. This week we will be making activity budgets for the data we collect. Primatologists make activity budgets to see what percentage of time a species spends doing various activities. For example, what percentage of time during the day does a chimp spend grooming, or resting, or standing upright or using tools. To calculate the percentage of time used for a specific activity, you divide the number of times you saw an individual doing that activity by the total number of behaviors you recorded:

So for example if you are interested in the percentage of time spent grooming:

$\{numberoftimesgroomingisrecorded÷numberofbehaviorsrecorded\}\times 100=percentageoftimespentgrooming$

Notice that your are dividing by the number of behaviors recorded and not just by the number of scans. Each scan will include a behavior for each individual in the group you are watching. So for example, if you recorded 25 scans while watching 2 chimps, then you recorded 50 behaviors.

Let's say you recorded 10 instances of grooming. You also recorded 15 scans of resting, 5 of tool use, 12 scans of eating, 1 of bipedal walking, 7 for all other locomotion.

Your activity budget would be:

• Grooming (10/50)X100 = 20%
• Resting (15/50)X100 = 30%
• Tool use (5/50)X100=10%
• Eating (12/50)X100 = 24%
• Bipedal walking (1/50)X100 = 2 %
• All other locomotion (7/50)X100 = 14%

One way to check your work is to make sure you have a total of 100% when you add up all the percentages for each behavior.

To get full credit for this experiment:

1. Using one of the cams listed below or another primate cam you found online, observe the primates for at least a half hour.
2. Every 20 seconds scan the group. Record what each individual is doing.
3. Calculate the percentage for time spent on each behavior to generate your activity budget for the group.
4. Post your results in a table or generate a pie chart at Create a Graph (http://nces.ed.gov/nceskids/createagraph/default.aspx (链接到外部网站。)链接到外部网站。), to make an activity budget chart like the one attached at the bottom of the page.
5. Describe your results using 175 words or more. What species did you observe? Were you surprised by the proportion of time spent doing each behavior? Did you see any behavior that you would consider to be of importance to human evolution? What might that tell us about the common ancestor that humans and modern primates share?
6. Cite your references, including the URL for the webcam you used.
7. Now comment on the work of two other students using 25 words or more per comment.

Two primate cams I recommend:

• San Diego Zoo Ape Cam:

http://zoo.sandiegozoo.org/cams/ape-cam (链接到外部网站。)链接到外部网站。

• Houston Zoo Ape Cams:

http://www.houstonzoo.org/meet-the-animals/chimpanzee-window-cam/ (链接到外部网站。)链接到外部网站。 (链接到外部网站。)链接到外部网站。

http://www.houstonzoo.org/meet-the-animals/chimpanzee-yard-cam/ (链接到外部网站。)链接到外部网站。

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