From the beginning, I loved Professor Perry. She was so kind and helpful during the remote instruction quarter and battled horrible internet connection and her limited technological knowledge to still provide us with the best class experience possible. Every week we would have a quiz and in the end, we were able to drop three of our lowest quiz scores which was more than generous. I do have to admit that the quizzes were a bit tricky and some of them asked about specific details so you do really have to know your stuff.
Other than that, she replies to student emails really quickly and really cares about students' mental health and learning as she provided us with alternatives if we were unable to purchase the course reader (which I do not recommend purchasing anyways because I did none of the readings and got an A) and even posted recipes and resources for students that need help cooking during the stay-at-home order. Definitely take this class if you love animals (monkeys in particular); not only will you learn about their lifestyle but also how their behavior is paralleled in humans and other species.

TLDR: Class is just a multiple choice midterm and a multiple choice final. Curved so 1/3 get an A, 1/3 B, 1/3 C. Lectures are recorded and notes are posted.

This class is pretty mellow if you watch all the lectures and take notes or annotate the existing notes. I basically just had to study for a few hours in the days leading up to the exam and got a 30/40 and a 46/60 which I like to think was mostly due to poorly worded questions. However this curved up to an A surprisingly so happy with that.

The class is mildly interesting but definitely dry at times. If you can power through the lull you should have no problem succeeding. I personally think monkeys are crazy little critters so it was cool learning about them.

As for Professor Perry, she is lovely. Very soft-spoken yet incredibly passionate about what she does. Her lectures are pretty clear but it is sometimes difficult to deduce what she wants you to know come exam time. Sometimes the studies she presented had contradictory results and she acknowledged that but when we were faced with an exam question it was difficult to know what study we should apply. Other than that I have no complaints. Lovely professor, solid class, nice curve. I’d recommend.

If you're not at all interested in the primate "nonhuman" part of "nonhuman to human," you shouldn't take this class. It is almost entirely primate focused, not human. I will say that I don't think I was especially interested in primates before, but I am now! Some prior interest in wildlife would definitely make the class more interesting though. Once you get past the first few weeks, which are mainly introductions to basic concepts of studying behavior and initially learning about different primate species, the class gets much more interesting! You'll learn about how the diets and social structures of different species affect their brain size, for example. I always enjoyed hearing about Dr. Perry's personal experiences with studying capuchins. She built resources and optional activities into the class for aspiring anthropologists and people who want to work in wildlife conservation, and held a more casual lunch with students towards the end of the quarter. You can tell she really cares about supporting students. Even though your grade in the class is entirely based on exams (40% midterm, 60% final), the exams are multiple-choice Scantrons, and the curves are generous!

Her class is graded on a curve such that only 33% of the class gets each grade, A,B and C, So no one fails. Her powerpoints contain audio with critical information.

Def take this class, hella easy, super insightful, Prof Perry is so nice, kind, helpful and smart. Really cool class on monkeys.

The class was a little bit harder than I was ready for but I still really, really enjoyed it. The book for the class was written by her and is incredibly interesting and she is one of the foremost in the field of studying white-faced capuchin monkeys. I would have loved to take her class in person as the lectures were a little bit dull through PowerPoint but still super interesting. The quizzes were fairly hard, really, really study before them and you should be fine but they're a bit awkwardly worded so it can be hard to get every one right. But she is flexible with the grades and lets you drop the lowest two. She also is super sweet and offers a lot of resources, for the class and otherwise, another reason why I wish I could take her class in person. Overall, if you like animals, especially monkeys, and animal behavior this is a great class!

Took this class online Spring 2020. Professor Perry's lectures were clear and the class overall doesn't require too much of your time. I think the topics were very interesting. She is very responsive when it comes to replying back to emails. I don't regret taking this course. Her grading was based off only weekly quizzes, no final or midterms. She is very passionate about her work. I did end up with a 79.45% and emailed her and she wasn't willing to round me up to a B-

Reselling the course reader, email: *************

It should be fair to consider that I took this class during the Spring 2020 Covid-19 outbreak. With that said take this review with partiality, because I was not able to receive a full intellectual experience in-person. I have read here in the reviews that she gave in-class short essay exams for the midterm and final. But for distant learning she gave us weekly quizzes. Each quiz consisted of 10 multiple choice questions each. I have to say these quizzes required you to know the weekly material in very fine detail. She also assigns weekly readings which comprise of her book and a course reader that includes several research articles. Her book cost $35 and the course reader cost $28. You’ll have to make a trip into Westwood to purchase the course reader because you can not purchase it online or on campus. I’m not sure if she used slides in class pre-Covid outbreak but for us she uploaded slides with audio commentary to further explain the material. I learned a lot about sexual selection, social intelligence, primate taxonomy, dominance and the evolution of intelligence. This class is not difficult, but it’s not an easy A. I probably spent more time studying for this class then my other two classes and I still got a B. I really enjoyed her class, she seems very approachable if you have questions, and she added all types of interesting optional assignments (how to write grant proposals, primate research opportunities, and tons of other interesting stuff if you want to further your academic career in research). I would definitely recommend this class if you’re interested in primate behavior.

I took this class spring 2020, so I'm not sure how relevant the coursework we did will be to other quarters (unless you're taking the class also online). Our grade originally consisted of 9 quizzes (no midterm, no final) the lowest 2 of which you could drop. At the end of the quarter, Professor Perry changed this to be able to drop the lowest 3, due to the BLM protests. The class is curved, but only to help student grades (i.e. you will never receive a grade lower than the percentage that you earned). The quizzes were not difficult, as long as you did the readings, listened to lectures and took notes. Most of the lectures there were lecture notes provided, with most of the important information (you did need to add some details from the narrated powerpoints she provided). They were just ccle quizzes, 10 MC questions each week. The main reason I am writing this review, is that Professor Perry, out of all my professors this quarter, was the most accommodating given the transition to online classes, coronavirus, and now of course the BLM protests. You can tell she is very passionate about what she does, the subject is interesting enough, and she really cares about students mental health. She provided alternative sources for readings from the course reader so students didn't have to buy it, and the chapters from her book are also available online. Overall, Professor Perry is one of the nicest professors I have ever had at UCLA and I would honestly recommend taking the course just for this professor, she is so kind and teaches the material earnestly.

I hated this class. Got an A on the midterm and then failed the final. It was so incredibly boring and unclear, tests were written badly, and the class was not what was in the description. She only talks about her own research, makes you buy books she has written, and has ridiculously specific test questions about what the name of the money is who did a specific action in the book. Don't take this class. She also plays really long videos in the dark, and i fell asleep in class for the first time ever.