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Anth 1026 > Ch 7 Primate Behaviour > Flashcards

Ch 7 Primate Behaviour Flashcards

1
Q

Behavioural Ecology

A

“The way an animal adapts behaviourally to their environment”
• Behavioural similarities represent millions of years of evolution (natural selection)
• Genetic drift, founders’ effect… could be related to any of these, most related to natural selection

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2
Q

Homoplasy vs. homology

A

Homoplasy – similarity due to convergent evolution (derived)

Homology – similarity due to evolutionary descent (ancestral)

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3
Q

First Primate Studies:

Free ranging, field studies, lab studies

A

17th Century – anatomy of captive primates
Colonies of free-ranging primates

Field studies began 1960s/70s

Laboratory experimental studies began 1950s/60s

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4
Q

Behavioural Genetics

A
  • Study of how genes affect behaviour
  • Behaviour must be viewed as a complex interaction between genetic and environmental factors
  • Primates have very high capacity for behavioural flexibility
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5
Q

Factors Influencing Social Living:

Diet, body size, BMR

A

Diet
- Large animals that don’t need energy dense foods can eat almost anything, so they don’t expend much energy looking for food, because it’s everywhere

Body Size
- Small mammals need to eat more than large mammals per unit of weight

Basal Metabolic Rate (BMR)

  • Smaller animals have a higher BMR
  • Smaller animals require an energy-rich diet (insects, fruits, seeds; NOT leaves)
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6
Q

Factors Influencing Social Living:

Resources, predation

A

Distribution of Resources
- Abundance vs. scarcity; dense vs. spread-out; clumping, seasonality

Predation
- Smaller animals can be prey for snakes, leopards, wild dogs and other primates

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7
Q

Factors Influencing Social Living:

Dispersal

A
  • Members of one sex leave the group upon sexual maturity
  • Male dispersal most common, many with female dispersal, some species with both
  • Minimizes conflict and inbreeding
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8
Q

Factors Influencing Social Living:

Life history

A
  • Characteristics of developmental stages
  • Identify the species and influence reproductive rates
    Ex. Length of gestation, length of interbirth interval, age of weaning, age of sexual maturity, life expectancy
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9
Q

Factors Influencing Social Living:

Activity Patterns, human activities

A

Activity Patterns
- Diurnal vs. nocturnal

Human Activities

  • Most populations are now imp acted by human hunting and forest clearing
  • Disrupt, isolate groups, reduce numbers, reduce resources, cause extinction
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10
Q

Social Living:

Advantages

A
  • Maximize food exploitation
  • Sharing information and defending food sites
  • Improved reproductive fitness (more partners available)
  • *Protection from predators
  • Help in caring for offspring
  • Transmission of knowledge/ behaviours
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11
Q

Social Living:

Disadvantages

A
  • Increased conflict, greater aggression
  • Increased competition for food
  • Increased competition for mates (can result in lower birth rates)
  • Larger groups more likely to spread infectious disease
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12
Q

Dominance Hierarchies

A
  • Rank determined by competition (strength, aggression, alliances)
  • Sometimes parental rank
  • More common in multi-male/multi-female groups
  • Provide social stability and reduce conflict
  • Higher ranked females often have higher infant survival rates and decreased inter- birth intervals
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13
Q

Language and Communications

A

1) Visual (body position, facial expression)
2) Auditory (vocal)
3) Olfactory
4) Tactile (grooming)

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14
Q

Purposes of communication in primates

A
  • Mark territories
  • Warn of predators
  • Convey interest in mating
  • Draw attention to food resource
  • Threaten or avoid aggression
  • Reconcile with former opponent
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15
Q

Do NHP really possess language

A

In the 1960s sign language studies began
- Understand the symbol (ex. blueberry) but does not have grammar and syntax (does not know what a blueberry is)
By this definition they do not have language

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16
Q

Agnostic Behaviours

A

Acts of aggression common
- Threatening facial expressions/gestures
Ex. Baring canine teeth, chest thumping
- Physical fighting
- Male aggression more often brief & face-to-face
- Female aggression more often prolonged & indirect
- Documented in chimpanzees, bonobos, orangutans, baboons
- Rare in gorillas

17
Q

Affiliative Behaviours:

Alliances

A
  • Evolved indirectly through kin selection
  • Tendency to direct beneficial behaviour toward biological relatives in same social group
  • Indirect way to pass along genes

Ex. Getting access to food, sex, protection, hunting parties, territorial defence

18
Q

Affiliative Behaviours:

Grooming and Physical contact

A
  • Grooming reduces stress, reinforces social bonds, curries favours for food, sex, protection
  • Lowers cortisol levels (reduces stress)
  • Can occur between males and females, relatives, strangers
  • Frequency and duration depend on many actors
19
Q

Affiliative Behaviours:

Reconciliation

A
  • Common in groups with a lot of agonistic behaviours
  • ‘Make-up’ and ‘move-on’ Debates about empathy & altruism
  • Taking our ideas and applying them to these behaviours (anthropomorphism)
20
Q

K vs. R selection

A
  • Primates are K – produce few young and invest a lot of energy
  • Burden carried by the female
  • Length of reproductive cycles
    • Interbirth intervals
    • The more males help, the more the interbirth interval decreases
21
Q

Sexual Strategies:

Female

A

Choose ‘most fit’ and ‘quality’ male
Because higher degree of parental investment
- Choose dominant, or affiliative males
- Mate with multiple and unfamiliar males

22
Q

Sexual Strategies:

Male

A

As many females as possible ‘quantity’
- Because lower degree of parental investment
Results in male-male competition
- Larger body & canine size, ‘flashy adornments’
- Dominance rank, ability to coerce females
- Causes sexual dimorphism

23
Q

Sexual Strategies:

Male- Infanticide

A
  • Killed young offspring that might not have been theirs, the offspring remaining who were born could have been their offspring
  • Collected genes to test this, and yes it showed that the Alpha male may have more reproductive success
24
Q

Sexual Strategies:

Polygynous Groups vs. Multimale/female groups

A

Polygynous groups
- Alpha male spends a lot of time and energy actively excluding other adult males
Multimale/Multifemale groups
- Males usually compete in the presence of estrous females, within dominance hierarchy
- *Dominance rank not always associated with higher reproductive success

25
Q

Sexual Strategies:

Bonobos

A 
Hetero and homosexual behaviour 
-	Between related and unrelated individuals 
-	Humans and bonobos only species to have regular face-to-face sex 
Many purposes beyond reproduction 
-	Facilitate female group transfer
-	Reinforce social bonds
-	Reduce tension
-	Establish power alliances
26
Q

Do non-human primates have culture?

A

Culture

  • Things that are learned, shared and socially transmitted within a society and across generations
  • Most biological anthropologists say yes
27
Q

Tool use:

Chimpanzees

A
  • Twigs to extract termites
  • Hammerstones to crack
  • Sticks to dig for tubers, roots, bulbs
  • Fashion spears from twigs to hunt bush babies
  • Use different tools to get at subterranean vs. above-ground termites
28
Q

Tool use:

Bonobos

A
  • Captive male “Kanzi” – taught to make and use stone tools

- Wild population uses leaves as sponges, throw sticks, use twigs to scratch, fend off bees

29
Q

Tool use:

Orangutans

A

Only seen in a few groups- absent in most populations

  • Use sticks to scratch, fend off bees, modify sticks to extract fruit, honey, insects
  • Transmission of behaviour to other group members
30
Q

Tool use:

Gorillas

A
  • Use stick to test water depth, shrub trunk as a bridge
31
Q

Tool use:

Monkeys

A
  • Capuchins use stones to dig for grubs, tubers, crack open cashew nuts, and use sticks to get insects, honey
  • Monkeys have used stone tools for hundreds of years
32
Q

Zoopharmacognosy (Primate Medicine)

A

Consumption or anointment with plants, insects, soils, not for nutritional purposes
Examples:
• Capuchin monkeys rub themselves with citrus fruit containing antibacterial compounds
• Wedge-capped capuchins rub themselves with millipedes containing an insect repellent compound
• Geophagy (intentional consumption of soil) observed in many primates: Can neutralize plant toxins, treat GI upsets, protect against malaria

Anth 1026 (9 decks)

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