Probing the limited oculomotor range of common marmosets (Callithrix jacchus)

The ability to scan visual scenes to gather information is a critical adaptive skill across primates. The common marmoset, a small-bodied New World monkey and emerging model of social and visual neuroscience, relies heavily on rapid head movements in addition to eye movements to orient (Pandey et al., 2020; Singh et al., 2025). Previous studies have found a relatively restricted oculomotor range extending out about 10 visual degrees from the central position of rest (Mitchell et al., 2014; Singh et al., 2025). However, previous studies have either used empty arenas for exploration (Singh et al., 2025), or in head-fixed animals used exploration of images potentially biased centrally with posed stimuli (Mitchell et al., 2014). This leaves open questions about whether this restricted oculomotor range is due to physical constraints or a lack of attention-drawing stimuli in the periphery. Understanding marmosets oculomotor range is important for applying modern methods that use marker-less pose tracking of the head as a proxy for gaze direction, under the assumption eye gaze is relatively restricted and can be ignored (Meisner et al., 2025). Using high-precision eye tracking and free-viewing of a natural image and video with objects of interest placed in the periphery, we quantified the oculomotor range of head-fixed marmosets. Our results show limited changes in the range reported from previous studies, even with naturalistic stimuli including moving animals that were optimized to encourage peripheral viewing.