Why are these results important? Knowing that visitor presence has limited effects can (a) encourage cognitive research in zoo settings and (b) benefit science (and conservation) education when research settings allow visitors to watch apes taking part in studies.

We also found that the presence of their conspecifics did not modulate chimpanzees’ performance.

In short, we found that the presence and activity of zoo visitors did not influence chimpanzees’ working memory.

7/7 This study suggests a strong link between self-directed control and proactive control, which are two major developmental transitions in children’s executive function.

6/7 Interestingly, visual support affected these neural markers differently across age groups, revealing developmental differences in how children and adults prepare proactively.

5/7 Both children and adults showed higher frontolateral delta/theta power → proactive task selection AND Lower central mu power → motor preparation
on switch vs. repeat trials.

4/7 Children performed a voluntary task-switching task, with or without visual support for previous actions.

3/7 Specifically, we asked: do children engage self-directed control proactively like adults? And if so, are there age differences in the neural markers of task selection and motor preparation?

2/7 In this study, we examined the link between self-directedness (how executive function is engaged with decreasing external scaffolding) and proactiveness (how executive function is engaged in advance of cognitive demands).

1/7 Short takeaway: 5–6-year-old children engage self-directed control proactively like adults, as evidenced by oscillatory markers, although the effect differs from adults when visual support is provided.

But before: Big thanks to all the children who were so well-behaved with EEG caps on their heads! 🧠💖

In one sentence, we found that this presence slowed response latencies, particularly on proactive control trials, especially for younger children.