Tolerant food sharing and reciprocity is precluded by despotism among bonobos but not chimpanzees
Open accessAbstract
Tolerant food sharing among human foragers can largely be explained by reciprocity. In contrast, food sharing among chimpanzees and bonobos may not always reflect reciprocity, which could be explained by different dominance styles: in egalitarian societies reciprocity is expressed freely, while in more despotic groups dominants may hinder reciprocity. We tested the degree of reciprocity and the influence of dominance on food sharing among chimpanzees and bonobos in two captive groups. First, we found that chimpanzees shared more frequently, more tolerantly, and more actively than bonobos. Second, among chimpanzees, food received was the best predictor of food shared, indicating reciprocal exchange, whereas among bonobos transfers were mostly unidirectional. Third, chimpanzees had a shallower and less linear dominance hierarchy, indicating that they were less despotic than bonobos. This suggests that the tolerant and reciprocal sharing found in chimpanzees, but not bonobos, was made possible by the absence of despotism. To investigate this further, we tested the relationship between despotism and reciprocity in grooming using data from an additional five groups and five different study periods on the main groups. The results showed that i) all chimpanzee groups were less despotic and groomed more reciprocally than bonobo groups, and ii) there was a general negative correlation between despotism and grooming reciprocity across species. This indicates that an egalitarian hierarchy may be more common in chimpanzees, at least in captivity, thus fostering reciprocal exchange. We conclude that a shallow dominance hierarchy was a necessary precondition for the evolution of human‐like reciprocal food sharing. Am J Phys Anthropol 143:41–51, 2010. © 2010 Wiley‐Liss, Inc.
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Food sharing between unrelated individuals outside the mating context is rare but has been reported for humans, vampire bats, chimpanzees and bonobos.
“Food sharing between unrelated individuals outside the mating context is rare but has been reported for humans, vampire bats, chimpanzees and bonobos [13,46,48,49,52].”
From Food sharing is linked to urinary oxytocin levels and bonding in related and unrelated wild chimpanzees (2014) · cites this paper as [48]
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- Authors
- Jaeggi, A. V., Stevens, J. M. G., & Van Schaik, C. P.
- Affiliations
- University of Zurich (CH)
- Royal Zoological Society of Antwerp (BE)
- Corresponding author
- Jaeggi, Adrian V.
- Venue
- American Journal of Physical Anthropology
- Publisher
- Wiley
- Published
- 2010-08-16
- Volume
- 143
- Issue
- 1
- Pages
- 41-51
- ISSN
- 0002-9483 (ISSN-L)
- 1096-8644
- OpenAlex
- W2082643407
- Cited by
- 205
- References
- 83
- Citations by year
- 2026: 3 · 2025: 6 · 2024: 5 · 2023: 44 · 2022: 9 · 2021: 19 · 2020: 4 · 2019: 10 · 2018: 7 · 2017: 17 · 2016: 20 · 2015: 20 · 2014: 8 · 2013: 9 · 2012: 11
- FWCI
- 13.44
- Type
- journal article
- Language
- en
- Open access
- green
- doi.org
- Locations
- American Journal of Physical Anthropology (publishedVersion)
- PubMed (publishedVersion)
- Zurich Open Repository and Archive (University of Zurich) (acceptedVersion)
- Zurich Open Repository and Archive (University of Zurich) (submittedVersion)
- Zurich Open Repository and Archive (University of Zurich)
- Funders
- Cogito Foundation
- Vlaamse regering
- Topics
- Social Sciences › Psychology › Social Psychology › Primate Behavior and Ecology
- Social Sciences › Psychology › Experimental and Cognitive Psychology › Evolutionary Psychology and Human Behavior
- Life Sciences › Agricultural and Biological Sciences › Ecology, Evolution, Behavior and Systematics › Animal Behavior and Reproduction
- Keywords
- food sharing, reciprocity, despotism, dominance hierarchy, bonobos, chimpanzees, grooming, egalitarianism, primate social behavior, evolution of cooperation
- MeSH terms
- Animals, Pan troglodytes, Cooperative Behavior, Feeding Behavior, Female, Male, Monte Carlo Method, Social Behavior, Social Dominance, Pan paniscus
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