Limited evidence for third-party affiliation during development in wild chimpanzees (Pan troglodytes schweinfurthii).

ABSTRACT: Examining the ontogeny of conflict-mitigating behaviours in our closest living relatives is an important component of understanding the evolutionary origins of cooperation in our species. In this study, we used 26 years of data to investigate the emergence of third-party affiliation (TPA), defined as affiliative contact given to recipients of aggression by uninvolved bystanders (regardless of initiation), in wild immature eastern chimpanzees (Pan troglodytes schweinfurthii) of Gombe National Park, Tanzania. We also characterized TPA by mothers in the same dataset as an adult benchmark for interpreting immature TPA patterns. In summary, we found that immatures did not express TPA as measured by grooming between the ages of 1.5 and 12.0 years, and that there was limited evidence that

SUBMITTER: Miller JA 

PROVIDER: S-EPMC5627097 | biostudies-literature | 2017 Sep

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature