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The dining etiquette of desert baboons: the roles of social bonds, kinship, and dominance in co‐feeding networks
Author(s) -
King Andrew J.,
Clark Fay E.,
Cowlishaw Guy
Publication year - 2011
Publication title -
american journal of primatology
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
SCImago Journal Rank - 0.988
H-Index - 81
eISSN - 1098-2345
pISSN - 0275-2565
DOI - 10.1002/ajp.20918
Subject(s) - foraging , kinship , sociality , primate , dominance (genetics) , social grooming , biology , aggression , dominance hierarchy , social network (sociolinguistics) , agonistic behaviour , scramble competition , baboon , social group , social organization , ecology , social psychology , competition (biology) , psychology , zoology , biochemistry , sociology , political science , anthropology , social media , law , gene
To better understand how individual relationships influence patterns of social foraging in primate groups, we explored networks of co‐feeding in wild desert baboons ( Papio ursinus ). To minimize the risk of aggression and injury associated with contest competition, we expected that individual group members would choose to co‐feed with those group‐mates that are most likely to show tolerance and a willingness to share food patches. We tested two alternative hypotheses about who those group‐mates might be: the “social bonds hypothesis” predicts that preferred foraging partners will be those with whom individuals share strong social bonds, indexed by grooming, whereas the “kinship hypothesis” predicts that preferred foraging partners will be relatives. We also investigated and controlled for the effects of dominance rank, given that competitive ability is known to shape foraging patterns. Social network analyses of over 5,000 foraging events for 14 adults in a single troop revealed that baboon co‐feeding was significantly correlated with grooming relationships but not genetic relatedness, and this finding was also true of the female‐only co‐feeding network. Dominant individuals were also found to be central to the co‐feeding network, frequently sharing food patches with multiple group‐mates. This polyadic analysis of foraging associations between individuals underlines the importance of dominance and affiliation to patterns of primate social foraging. Am. J. Primatol. 73:768–774, 2011. © 2011 Wiley‐Liss, Inc.