Social affiliation matters: both same-sex and opposite-sex relationships predict survival in wild female baboons
Social integration and support can have profound effects on human survival. The extent of this phenomenon in non-human animals is largely unknown, but such knowledge is important to understanding the evolution of both lifespan and sociality. Here, we report evidence that levels of affiliative social...
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Published in | Proceedings of the Royal Society. B, Biological sciences Vol. 281; no. 1793; p. 20141261 |
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Main Authors | , , , , |
Format | Journal Article |
Language | English |
Published |
England
The Royal Society
22.10.2014
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Subjects | |
Online Access | Get full text |
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Summary: | Social integration and support can have profound effects on human survival. The extent of this phenomenon in non-human animals is largely unknown, but such knowledge is important to understanding the evolution of both lifespan and sociality. Here, we report evidence that levels of affiliative social behaviour (i.e. ‘social connectedness’) with both same-sex and opposite-sex conspecifics predict adult survival in wild female baboons. In the Amboseli ecosystem in Kenya, adult female baboons that were socially connected to either adult males or adult females lived longer than females who were socially isolated from both sexes—females with strong connectedness to individuals of both sexes lived the longest. Female social connectedness to males was predicted by high dominance rank, indicating that males are a limited resource for females, and females compete for access to male social partners. To date, only a handful of animal studies have found that social relationships may affect survival. This study extends those findings by examining relationships to both sexes in by far the largest dataset yet examined for any animal. Our results support the idea that social effects on survival are evolutionarily conserved in social mammals. |
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Bibliography: | istex:A8B2AD167BDD18A602A4F0D3AE26B58B034D1EB5 href:rspb20141261.pdf ark:/67375/V84-RQNZH1RN-5 ArticleID:rspb20141261 ObjectType-Article-1 SourceType-Scholarly Journals-1 ObjectType-Feature-2 content type line 23 |
ISSN: | 0962-8452 1471-2954 |
DOI: | 10.1098/rspb.2014.1261 |