Differences between chimpanzees and bonobos in neural systems supporting social cognition.

ABSTRACT: Our two closest living primate relatives, chimpanzees (Pan troglodytes) and bonobos (Pan paniscus), exhibit significant behavioral differences despite belonging to the same genus and sharing a very recent common ancestor. Differences have been reported in multiple aspects of social behavior, including aggression, sex, play and cooperation. However, the neurobiological basis of these differences has only been minimally investigated and remains uncertain. Here, we present the first ever comparison of chimpanzee and bonobo brains using diffusion tensor imaging, supplemented with a voxel-wise analysis of T1-weighted images to specifically compare neural circuitry implicated in social cognition. We find that bonobos have more gray matter in brain regions involved in perceiving distress in both

SUBMITTER: Rilling JK 

PROVIDER: S-EPMC3324566 | biostudies-literature | 2012 Apr

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature