Since September 2020, Karline Janmaat has been an associate professor of Cognitive Behavioral Ecology at the Cognitive Psychology Section of the Institute of Psychology and the Institute of Biology at Leiden University and the ARTIS Zoo in Amsterdam.

More information about Karline Janmaat

Short CV

Since September 2020, Karline Janmaat has been an associate professor of Cognitive Behavioral Ecology at the Cognitive Psychology Section of the Institute of Psychology and the Institute of Biology at Leiden University and the ARTIS Zoo in Amsterdam.

Karline studied Ecology at the University of Amsterdam. She obtained her PhD in Evolutionary Psychology in 2007 at the University of St Andrews. She held a position as a postdoctoral researcher at the Max Planck Institute for Evolutionary Anthropology in Leipzig, for a period of 11 yrs, where she became a group leader of the Foraging Cognition Group. From here she continued her career developing a minor in Evolutionary Psychobiology at the University of Amsterdam and now holds a part-time position as associate professor at the Institute of Biodiversity and Ecosystem at the University of Amsterdam.  She became a group leader of the research project “Comparative movement ecology of human and non-human foragers” at the Max Planck Institute for Animal Behaviour in Konstanz. From September 2020 she became an endowed professor with special appointment in Cognitive Behavioural Ecology at the Cognitive Psychology department and the Institute of Biology at Leiden University and the ARTIS zoo.

Research

For the past 20 years Karline has conducted comparative psychological research on the foraging cognition of humans, apes and monkeys. Karline’ research encompasses investigations on the extent of cognitive abilities in foragers, such as episodic-like memory and flexible route planning, and the socio-ecological context in which they employ them. By contributing such data to a comparative framework, and working in collaboration with field- and lab-based researchers, she aims to increase our understanding of the evolutionary function of foraging cognition and its variation and plasticity. She furthermore assesses and when needed aims to improve the mental well-being of zoo-based animals by implementing knowledge on the daily challenges faced by conspecifics in the natural habitat. With a team of interdisciplinary students, ARTIS management and ARTIS care takers she investigates the behaviour of the animals in ARTIS and facilitates cognitive enrichment projects.

Teaching

I am currently coordinating and lecturing in courses in the minors Brain and Cognition (LEI) and Evolutionary Psychobiology (UvA) and supervise B.Sc., M.Sc. and Ph.D. projects in ARTIS and the field This concerns international and interdisciplinary students from the minors Biology (LEI and UvA) and Psychology (LEI) and the MSc tracks Applied Cognitive Psychology (LEI) and Ecology and Evolution (UvA).
 

Grants

•    Templeton Charity Foundation grant
•    Southwest National Primate Research grant
•    Franklin Mosher Baldwin Memorial Fellowship grant
•    Leakey Foundation grant
•    Max Planck Society Stipendium
•    Stiching Kronendak grant
•    Treub Foundation grant
•    Alberta Mennega foundation grant

Supervised PhD Candidates

• Haneul Jang, Examining human spatial abilities in a tropical forest: a mixed-methods study among the Mbendjele BaYaka of the Republic of Congo, 2020.
• Simone D. Ban, Inference des connaissances spatio-temporelles et des preferences alimentaires sur la prise de decisions des chimpanzes sauvages du Parc National de Tai (Côte d’Ivoire), lors de la recherché de nourriture, 2017.
• Miguel Guinea Luengo, Navigating in rainforests movement pattern in a neotropical primate: The black howler monkey, 2020.
• Bill Loubelo, Cartographie du gradient végétation par télédétection et évaluation des stocks de carbone forestier dans les forêts du nord Congo, 2018

Registrations

   • Scottish Primate Research Group
   • International Primatological Society
   • Association for the Study of Animal Behaviour
   • International Society for Hunter Gatherer Research (ISHGR)
   • Cognition, Behavior and Evolution Network (CBEN)

Relevant Links

•    LinkedIn
•    Research Gate
•    Website 
•    YouTube   

Activities