Chimpanzee cooperatorsMarch 03, 2006In the animal kingdom cooperation is crucial for survival. Predators hunt in prides and prey band together to protect themselves. Yet no other creature cooperates as successfully as we do. But where did this ability come from, and is it uniquely human? In a new study to be published in Science on 3 March 2006, Alicia Melis and co-authors from the Max Planck Institute for Evolutionary Anthropology, Leipzig, Germany show that our close relatives, chimpanzees, are much better cooperators than we thought. 'We've never seen this level of understanding during cooperation in any other animals except humans,' says Melis. Cooperation happens all the time in the animal kingdom. A pride of lions cooperates to hunt down a gazelle. A herd of elephants band together to protect themselves from predators. But there may not be much thinking going on behind this kind of cooperation. It could be that by each animal wanting the same thing and working at the same time, success happens by accident. In Melis' study which took place at Ngamba Island Chimpanzee Sanctuary in Uganda, not only did chimpanzees understand when they needed help, they understood their role, their partner's role, and chose who they wanted to work with. To reach a food tray, the chimpanzees had to pull two ends of a rope which dragged the tray towards them. Both rope ends had to be pulled at the same time or the rope was simply pulled out. Melis found that the chimpanzees only let a partner into the room (by opening their door) when the rope ends were too far apart to pull them on their own. 'Not only did they need to know when they needed help, they had to go out and get it.' Melis says. 'Then they had to wait until their partner came in and pull on the rope at the same time. The chimps really had to understand why they needed their partner.' Just like people, there were better cooperators than others. Mawa, the dominant chimpanzee, was not a very good cooperator. He didn't wait for his partner and often pulled the rope from the tray. Bwambale, on the other hand, was a great cooperator. He always waited for his partner and was nearly always successful in getting the food. At first, the chimpanzees chose Mawa and Bwambale equally, but when the chimpanzees learned what a hopeless cooperator Mawa was, most chose Bwambale on the next trial. Melis was excited by the results. 'This is the first study that lets chimps choose who they want to cooperate with. We found that chimps choose a partner based on their effectiveness. Clearly, chimps can remember who's a good and who's a bad collaborator. Bad collaborators suffer by not being chosen next time.' This complexity of cooperation means that humans and chimpanzees might have inherited our cooperative abilities from our common ancestor 6 million years ago. However, Melis is quick to draw the line between chimpanzee and human cooperation. 'There is still no evidence that chimpanzees communicate with each other about a common goal like children do from a very early age. There's also no evidence that chimpanzees can learn how good a partner is by watching them interact with others. It just suggests that when chimpanzees cooperate they understand a bit more than we thought. Hopefully, future studies can show us what it is that makes human cooperation so unique.' Melis' studies are among the first to be done in a chimpanzee sanctuary in Africa. 'Sanctuaries are doing an incredible job saving chimps whose families were killed by the bush-meat trade. They also provide a wonderful service to us and the research community. Hopefully, as these and similar results become more widely known, it will raise awareness that these are intelligent animals who deserve respect and protection.' Max Planck Society for the Advancement of Science |
|||||||||||||||||||||
| Related Chimpanzee Current Events and Chimpanzee News Articles 'Hobbits' are a new human species -- according to the statistical analysis of fossils Researchers from Stony Brook University Medical Center in New York have confirmed that Homo floresiensis is a genuine ancient human species and not a descendant of healthy humans dwarfed by disease. Why can't chimps speak? If humans are genetically related to chimps, why did our brains develop the innate ability for language and speech while theirs did not? Chimpanzees help each other on request but not voluntarily The evolution of altruism has long puzzled researchers and has mainly been explained previously from ultimate perspectives-I will help you now because I expect there to be some long-term benefit to me. Early hominid first walked on two legs in the woods Among the many surprises associated with the discovery of the oldest known, nearly complete skeleton of a hominid is the finding that this species took its first steps toward bipedalism not on the open, grassy savanna, as generations of scientists - going back to Charles Darwin - hypothesized, but in a wooded landscape. Ardi displaces Lucy as oldest hominid skeleton Nearly 17 years after plucking the fossilized tooth of a new human ancestor from a pebbly desert in Ethiopia, an international team of scientists today announced their reconstruction of a partial skeleton of the hominid, Ardipithecus ramidus, which they say revolutionizes our understanding of the earliest phase of human evolution. Chimpanzees develop specialized tool kits to catch army ants Chimpanzees in the Congo have developed specialized "tool kits" to forage for army ants, reveals new research published Sept. 3 in the American Journal of Primatology. Zoo volunteers help explain mysteries of the genome As the University of Leicester approaches the 25th anniversary of the discovery of DNA fingerprinting (September 10), Leicester geneticists interested in a particular type of DNA are receiving some help from an unusual band of assistants. Scientists report original source of malaria Researchers have identified what they believe is the original source of malignant malaria: a parasite found in chimpanzees in equatorial Africa. Orangutans unique in movement through tree tops Movement through a complex meshwork of small branches at the heights of tropical forests presents a unique challenge to animals wanting to forage for food safely. Chimps, like humans, focus on faces A chimp's attention is captured by faces more effectively than by bananas. A series of experiments described in BioMed Central's open access journal Frontiers in Zoology suggests that the apes are wired to respond to faces in a similar manner to humans. More Chimpanzee Current Events and Chimpanzee News Articles |
|||||||||||||||||||||
|
|||||||||||||||||||||
|
|||||||||||||||||||||