What would you do if you saw yourself in a mirror for the first time? When, after weeks of training, rhesus monkeys learned the true identity of their reflections, one of the first things they did was check out all the locales on their bodies they’d never before seen — and we mean every intimate nook and cranny.
The fact that these monkeys could look in a mirror and recognize those nether regions was stunning. That’s because rhesus monkeys have never proven that they can recognize themselves in a mirror. However, researchers proved that, through a little training, they could foster a certain sense of self-awareness in these primates. And that could teach us more about how the brains of humans and other primates allow them to self-recognize in a mirror.
