ScienceDaily (Dec. 1, 2011) — Sharing food has widely been considered by scholars as a defining characteristic of human behavior. But a new study by Iowa State University anthropology professor Jill Pruetz now reports that chimpanzees from her Fongoli research site in Senegal also frequently share food and hunting tools with other chimps.
Co-authored by ISU anthropology graduate student Stacy Lindshield, their study is posted online in Primates and will be published in a future issue of the journal.
The researchers witnessed 41 cases of Fongoli chimpanzees willingly transferring either wild plant foods or hunting tools to other chimpanzees. While previous research by primatologists had documented chimps transferring meat among other non-relatives, this is the first study to document non-meat sharing behavior.
"They're [the Fongoli chimps] not the only chimps that share, but in terms of the resources that we cover here, that is unique," said Pruetz (left), who was named a 2008 National Geographic Emerging Explorer for her research on savanna chimpanzees in Senegal. "I guess all chimps share meat, but they don't share plants or tools. Yet they do here, in addition to meat. It was intriguing when we first started seeing these events."
Read more here ...
Showing posts with label human behaviour. Show all posts
Showing posts with label human behaviour. Show all posts
Tuesday, December 13, 2011
Monday, July 18, 2011
Swarms of Locusts Use Social Networking to Communicate
ScienceDaily (July 15, 2011) — Social studies of Facebook and Twitter have been adapted to gain a greater understanding of the swarming behaviour of locusts. The enormous success of social networking sites has vividly illustrated the importance of networking for humans; however for some animals, keeping informed about others of their kind is even more important.
In a study published on July 15, 2011, in the Institute of Physics and German Physical Society's New Journal of Physics, researchers have shown that swarming, a phenomenon that can be crucial to an animal's survival, is created by the same kind of social networks that humans adopt.
Since the 1980s, scientists have been programming computer models to realistically reproduce flocks of birds, schools of fish, herds of quadrupeds and swarms of insects. However, the question of how these groups coordinate to move together has remained a mystery.
It remains more of a mystery when each organism can only see a small area around them, when they are affected by unpredictable changes in the environment, and when there is no clear leader of the collective behaviour.
Researchers from the Max Planck Institute for Physics of Complex Systems, as well as a US-based scientist supported by the National Science Foundation, addressed this problem from a different perspective: network science.
They used ideas from previous studies on opinion formation in social networks, such as Facebook and Twitter, and applied them to a previous study of 120 locust nymphs marching in a ring-shaped arena in the lab.
Studies have shown that the decisions you make, or the opinion you have, are strongly influenced by the decisions and opinions of your friends, or more generally, your contacts in your social network.
Locusts rely heavily on swarming as they are in fact cannibalistic. As they march across barren deserts, locusts carefully keep track of each other so they can remain within striking distance to consume one another -- a cruel, but very efficient, survival strategy.
The study used a computer model to explicitly simulate the social network among locusts and found that the most important component needed to reproduce the movements seen in the lab is the social interactions that occur when locusts, walking in one direction, convince others to walk in the same direction.
The researchers state that it may not be obvious that animals are creating the equivalent of our human social networks however this is the precise mechanism behind swarming transition.
One of the study's authors, Gerd Zschaler, said, "We concluded that the mechanism through which locusts agree on a direction to move together (sometimes with devastating consequences, such as locust plagues) is the same we sometimes use to decide where to live or where to go out: we let ourselves be convinced by those in our social network, often by those going in the opposite direction."
"We don't necessarily pay more attention to those doing the same as us, but many times [we pay more attention] to those doing something different."
http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2011/07/110714191435.htm
In a study published on July 15, 2011, in the Institute of Physics and German Physical Society's New Journal of Physics, researchers have shown that swarming, a phenomenon that can be crucial to an animal's survival, is created by the same kind of social networks that humans adopt.
Since the 1980s, scientists have been programming computer models to realistically reproduce flocks of birds, schools of fish, herds of quadrupeds and swarms of insects. However, the question of how these groups coordinate to move together has remained a mystery.
It remains more of a mystery when each organism can only see a small area around them, when they are affected by unpredictable changes in the environment, and when there is no clear leader of the collective behaviour.
Researchers from the Max Planck Institute for Physics of Complex Systems, as well as a US-based scientist supported by the National Science Foundation, addressed this problem from a different perspective: network science.
They used ideas from previous studies on opinion formation in social networks, such as Facebook and Twitter, and applied them to a previous study of 120 locust nymphs marching in a ring-shaped arena in the lab.
Studies have shown that the decisions you make, or the opinion you have, are strongly influenced by the decisions and opinions of your friends, or more generally, your contacts in your social network.
Locusts rely heavily on swarming as they are in fact cannibalistic. As they march across barren deserts, locusts carefully keep track of each other so they can remain within striking distance to consume one another -- a cruel, but very efficient, survival strategy.
The study used a computer model to explicitly simulate the social network among locusts and found that the most important component needed to reproduce the movements seen in the lab is the social interactions that occur when locusts, walking in one direction, convince others to walk in the same direction.
The researchers state that it may not be obvious that animals are creating the equivalent of our human social networks however this is the precise mechanism behind swarming transition.
One of the study's authors, Gerd Zschaler, said, "We concluded that the mechanism through which locusts agree on a direction to move together (sometimes with devastating consequences, such as locust plagues) is the same we sometimes use to decide where to live or where to go out: we let ourselves be convinced by those in our social network, often by those going in the opposite direction."
"We don't necessarily pay more attention to those doing the same as us, but many times [we pay more attention] to those doing something different."
http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2011/07/110714191435.htm
Thursday, December 23, 2010
Young female chimps use sticks for 'play-mothering' (via D R Shoop)
Young female chimps carry sticks as a form of "play-mothering," much in the same way girls cradle their dolls, scientists said Monday.
The findings, published online in the journal Current Biology, imply that gender roles might be more biologically rooted than some people think, the authors said - and that might hold for human beings, too.
Lead author Sonya Kahlenberg, a biological anthropologist at Bates College in Lewiston, Maine, looked at incidences of stick-carrying in a chimp community in Uganda's Kibale National Park over a period of 14 years. After examining more than 100 cases, she and coauthor Richard Wrangham, a biological anthropologist at Harvard University, noticed a distinct gender difference. Of the young females, 67% carried sticks, as opposed to just 31% of males.
Aside from their other stick-related activities - using them to probe holes that might hold honey or water, or brandishing them like weapons - the young chimps would also occasionally cradle a longer, thicker stick as they went about their business, almost as if it were a baby.
They would even bring the sticks into their nests, which never happened with the sticks used for honey-hunting or play-fighting. Some of the young chimps even played the "airplane" game: lying on their backs and lifting the stick in the air, much as human parents entertain their youngsters.
The authors say the stick-carrying demonstrates a type of "play-mothering." Those males who did carry sticks stopped doing so as they grew older, and the females would cease when they gave birth.
"This is an entirely new way of thinking with which I entirely agree," said Joyce Benenson, a developmental psychologist at Emmanuel College in Boston who was not involved in the research. The same tendencies can be seen in human baby girls and boys, she added, at a time too early for parents to have imposed their gender ideas on their infants.
Kahlenberg pointed to previous research showing that when presented with dolls or trucks, female chimps in captivity preferred the dolls and males went for the trucks. The males may have gravitated toward the trucks because they intuitively favor toys that allow more freedom of movement, she said.
But Kahlenberg added it was probable that the stick-carrying was a socially learned tradition subtly passed from one generation to the next, unique to this particular chimpanzee community.
"It's kind of a unique case of having nature and nurture in one community ..
Everything is so intertwined," she said.
Kahlenberg herself is waiting to see which toys her 9-month-old daughter picks up. "Right now it's just blocks .. It's too early to say," she said.
http://www.latimes.com/news/science/la-sci-chimp-dolls-20101221,0,2227081.story
The findings, published online in the journal Current Biology, imply that gender roles might be more biologically rooted than some people think, the authors said - and that might hold for human beings, too.
Lead author Sonya Kahlenberg, a biological anthropologist at Bates College in Lewiston, Maine, looked at incidences of stick-carrying in a chimp community in Uganda's Kibale National Park over a period of 14 years. After examining more than 100 cases, she and coauthor Richard Wrangham, a biological anthropologist at Harvard University, noticed a distinct gender difference. Of the young females, 67% carried sticks, as opposed to just 31% of males.
Aside from their other stick-related activities - using them to probe holes that might hold honey or water, or brandishing them like weapons - the young chimps would also occasionally cradle a longer, thicker stick as they went about their business, almost as if it were a baby.
They would even bring the sticks into their nests, which never happened with the sticks used for honey-hunting or play-fighting. Some of the young chimps even played the "airplane" game: lying on their backs and lifting the stick in the air, much as human parents entertain their youngsters.
The authors say the stick-carrying demonstrates a type of "play-mothering." Those males who did carry sticks stopped doing so as they grew older, and the females would cease when they gave birth.
"This is an entirely new way of thinking with which I entirely agree," said Joyce Benenson, a developmental psychologist at Emmanuel College in Boston who was not involved in the research. The same tendencies can be seen in human baby girls and boys, she added, at a time too early for parents to have imposed their gender ideas on their infants.
Kahlenberg pointed to previous research showing that when presented with dolls or trucks, female chimps in captivity preferred the dolls and males went for the trucks. The males may have gravitated toward the trucks because they intuitively favor toys that allow more freedom of movement, she said.
But Kahlenberg added it was probable that the stick-carrying was a socially learned tradition subtly passed from one generation to the next, unique to this particular chimpanzee community.
"It's kind of a unique case of having nature and nurture in one community ..
Everything is so intertwined," she said.
Kahlenberg herself is waiting to see which toys her 9-month-old daughter picks up. "Right now it's just blocks .. It's too early to say," she said.
http://www.latimes.com/news/science/la-sci-chimp-dolls-20101221,0,2227081.story
Young female chimps use sticks for 'play-mothering' (via D R Shoop)
Young female chimps carry sticks as a form of "play-mothering," much in the same way girls cradle their dolls, scientists said Monday.
The findings, published online in the journal Current Biology, imply that gender roles might be more biologically rooted than some people think, the authors said - and that might hold for human beings, too.
Lead author Sonya Kahlenberg, a biological anthropologist at Bates College in Lewiston, Maine, looked at incidences of stick-carrying in a chimp community in Uganda's Kibale National Park over a period of 14 years. After examining more than 100 cases, she and coauthor Richard Wrangham, a biological anthropologist at Harvard University, noticed a distinct gender difference. Of the young females, 67% carried sticks, as opposed to just 31% of males.
Aside from their other stick-related activities - using them to probe holes that might hold honey or water, or brandishing them like weapons - the young chimps would also occasionally cradle a longer, thicker stick as they went about their business, almost as if it were a baby.
They would even bring the sticks into their nests, which never happened with the sticks used for honey-hunting or play-fighting. Some of the young chimps even played the "airplane" game: lying on their backs and lifting the stick in the air, much as human parents entertain their youngsters.
The authors say the stick-carrying demonstrates a type of "play-mothering." Those males who did carry sticks stopped doing so as they grew older, and the females would cease when they gave birth.
"This is an entirely new way of thinking with which I entirely agree," said Joyce Benenson, a developmental psychologist at Emmanuel College in Boston who was not involved in the research. The same tendencies can be seen in human baby girls and boys, she added, at a time too early for parents to have imposed their gender ideas on their infants.
Kahlenberg pointed to previous research showing that when presented with dolls or trucks, female chimps in captivity preferred the dolls and males went for the trucks. The males may have gravitated toward the trucks because they intuitively favor toys that allow more freedom of movement, she said.
But Kahlenberg added it was probable that the stick-carrying was a socially learned tradition subtly passed from one generation to the next, unique to this particular chimpanzee community.
"It's kind of a unique case of having nature and nurture in one community ..
Everything is so intertwined," she said.
Kahlenberg herself is waiting to see which toys her 9-month-old daughter picks up. "Right now it's just blocks .. It's too early to say," she said.
http://www.latimes.com/news/science/la-sci-chimp-dolls-20101221,0,2227081.story
The findings, published online in the journal Current Biology, imply that gender roles might be more biologically rooted than some people think, the authors said - and that might hold for human beings, too.
Lead author Sonya Kahlenberg, a biological anthropologist at Bates College in Lewiston, Maine, looked at incidences of stick-carrying in a chimp community in Uganda's Kibale National Park over a period of 14 years. After examining more than 100 cases, she and coauthor Richard Wrangham, a biological anthropologist at Harvard University, noticed a distinct gender difference. Of the young females, 67% carried sticks, as opposed to just 31% of males.
Aside from their other stick-related activities - using them to probe holes that might hold honey or water, or brandishing them like weapons - the young chimps would also occasionally cradle a longer, thicker stick as they went about their business, almost as if it were a baby.
They would even bring the sticks into their nests, which never happened with the sticks used for honey-hunting or play-fighting. Some of the young chimps even played the "airplane" game: lying on their backs and lifting the stick in the air, much as human parents entertain their youngsters.
The authors say the stick-carrying demonstrates a type of "play-mothering." Those males who did carry sticks stopped doing so as they grew older, and the females would cease when they gave birth.
"This is an entirely new way of thinking with which I entirely agree," said Joyce Benenson, a developmental psychologist at Emmanuel College in Boston who was not involved in the research. The same tendencies can be seen in human baby girls and boys, she added, at a time too early for parents to have imposed their gender ideas on their infants.
Kahlenberg pointed to previous research showing that when presented with dolls or trucks, female chimps in captivity preferred the dolls and males went for the trucks. The males may have gravitated toward the trucks because they intuitively favor toys that allow more freedom of movement, she said.
But Kahlenberg added it was probable that the stick-carrying was a socially learned tradition subtly passed from one generation to the next, unique to this particular chimpanzee community.
"It's kind of a unique case of having nature and nurture in one community ..
Everything is so intertwined," she said.
Kahlenberg herself is waiting to see which toys her 9-month-old daughter picks up. "Right now it's just blocks .. It's too early to say," she said.
http://www.latimes.com/news/science/la-sci-chimp-dolls-20101221,0,2227081.story
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