Scientists from Anglia Ruskin University, University of St Andrews, University of Neuchatel and Universite du Quebec studied the spread of two novel feeding methods among the Sonso chimpanzee community living in Uganda’s Budongo Forest.
Chimpanzees are widely considered to be the most ‘cultural’ of all non-human animals, but most previous studies examining how behaviour is transmitted have been carried out among captive populations. Here, for the first time, the researchers could track in real time how a new natural behaviour was passed from individual to individual in a wild community.
The researchers in this new study investigated the spread of two variations of “leaf-sponging” which is a common behaviour among chimpanzees. The Sonso chimpanzees typically manufacture leaf-sponges by folding and chewing leaves in their mouth, and then dip them in a water source to drink.
During six days of continuous observation, various individuals were observed to develop two novel behaviours: leaf-sponge re-use, which is using a sponge that had been left from a previous visit, and moss-sponging, which is the production of a sponge made of moss or a mixture of leaves and moss. Neither moss-sponging nor leaf-sponge re-use had been previously observed in the Sonso community.
The analysis began when the group’s 29-year-old alpha male, Nick, made a moss sponge and began extracting water while being observed by Nambi, an adult dominant female. Over the next six days the waterhole was revisited regularly and the scientists observed a further seven individuals making and using moss sponges.
It was confirmed that six of these had observed the behaviour before adopting it themselves, the seventh was seen to re-use a discarded moss sponge so may have learned about the novel behaviour in this way.
The scientists also recorded a 12-year-old sub-adult male retrieve and use a discarded leaf sponge. A further eight individuals adopted this technique, but only four of them first observed another individual performing this behaviour.
By using a technique called network-based diffusion analysis it is estimated that each time they observed moss-sponging, “naïve” individuals enhanced their chances of developing moss-sponging by a factor of 15.
This striking effect contrasted with the re-use behaviour in which social learning seemed to play much less of a role. As the two behaviours occurred at the same time in the same location, the researchers could rule out many alternative explanations, greatly strengthening the case for social transmission of the moss sponging.
Dr William Hoppitt, Senior Lecturer in Zoology at Anglia Ruskin University, said: “Our results provide strong evidence for social transmission along the chimpanzees’ social network, demonstrating that wild chimpanzees learn novel tool-use from each other and support the claim that some of the observed behavioural diversity in wild chimpanzees should be interpreted as ‘cultural’.”
The study indicates that group-specific behavioural variants in wild chimpanzees can be socially learned, adding to the evidence that this prerequisite for culture originated in a common ancestor of great apes and humans, long before the advent of modern humans.
To read the PLOS Biology paper, please visit http://www.plosbiology.org/article/info:doi/10.1371/journal.pbio.1001960
*******
For more press information please contact:
Jon Green on t: 0845 196 4717, e: jon.green@anglia.ac.uk
Jamie Forsyth on t: 0845 196 4716, e: jamie.forsyth@anglia.ac.uk
__________________________________________________
Study shows how chimpanzees share skills
1 October 2014
The first recorded evidence of new behaviour being adopted and transmitted from individual to individual within a wild chimpanzee colony has been published in the latest edition of the journal PLOS Biology.