Assessing joint commitment as a process in great apes

Raphaela Heesen,Adrian Bangerter,Klaus Zuberbühler,Katia Iglesias,Christof Neumann,Aude Pajot,Laura Perrenoud,Jean-Pascal Guéry,Federico Rossano,Emilie Genty

doi:10.1016/j.isci.2021.102872

Abstract

SummaryMany social animals interact jointly, but only humans experience a specific sense of obligation toward their co-participants, a joint commitment. However, joint commitment is not only a mental state but also a process that reveals itself in the coordination efforts deployed during entry and exit phases of joint action. Here, we investigated the presence and duration of such phases in N = 1,242 natural play and grooming interactions of captive chimpanzees and bonobos. The apes frequently exchanged mutual gaze and communicative signals prior to and after engaging in joint activities with conspecifics, demonstrating entry and exit phases comparable to those of human joint activities. Although rank effects were less clear, phases in bonobos were more moderated by friendship compared to phases in chimpanzees, suggesting bonobos were more likely to reflect patterns analogous to human “face management”. This suggests that joint commitment as process was already present in our last common ancestor with Pan.

Highlights

Many social animal species engage in cooperative activities, which sometimes require participants to coordinate joint actions (Boesch, 2002; Holekamp et al, 2007; MacNulty et al, 2014; Pitman and Durban, 2012; Vail et al, 2013)
While the former is possessed by nonhuman species like great apes (Buttelmann et al, 2012; Call et al, 2004), the latter seems unique to humans (Buttelmann et al, 2017; but see Krupenye et al, 2016; Moore, 2020; Rakoczy, 2015; Tomasello, 2016)
General patterns of entry and exit phases in the social interactions of great apes When entering joint activities, we found that bonobos were more likely to produce entries than chimpanzees (Table 1)

Summary

Introduction

Many social animal species engage in cooperative activities, which sometimes require participants to coordinate joint actions (Boesch, 2002; Holekamp et al, 2007; MacNulty et al, 2014; Pitman and Durban, 2012; Vail et al, 2013). Joint commitments entail high-level abilities for cooperation, notably (1) the ability to conceive one’s co-participants as intentional agents whose behavior is goaldirected, and (2) the ability and proclivity to share experiences. While the former is possessed by nonhuman species like great apes (Buttelmann et al, 2012; Call et al, 2004), the latter seems unique to humans (Buttelmann et al, 2017; but see Krupenye et al, 2016; Moore, 2020; Rakoczy, 2015; Tomasello, 2016). This feeling of obligation presumably develops early in human children (Grafenhain et al, 2009; Grafenhain et al, 2013), but is disputed in great apes (Warneken et al, 2006; but see new evidence Heesen et al, 2020)

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