Abstract
Cooperative hunting and meat sharing are hypothesized as fundamental to human life history adaptations and biological success. Wild chimpanzees also hunt in groups, and despite the potential of inferring ancestral hominid adaptations, it remains unclear whether chimpanzee hunting is a cooperative act. Here we show support for cooperative acquisition in wild chimpanzees since hunters are more likely to receive meat than bystanders, independent of begging effort. Engagement in prey searches and higher hunt participation independently increase hunting success, suggesting that coordination may improve motivation in joint tasks. We also find higher levels of urinary oxytocin after hunts and prey searches compared with controls. We conclude that chimpanzee hunting is cooperative, likely facilitated by behavioral and neuroendocrine mechanisms of coordination and reward. If group hunting has shaped humans’ life history traits, perhaps similar pressures acted upon life history patterns in the last common ancestor of human and chimpanzee.
Highlights
Cooperative hunting and meat sharing are hypothesized as fundamental to human life history adaptations and biological success
The sharing of meat may facilitate future participation in similar tasks by rewarding participants for their labor[10]. Such is posited in the cooperative acquisition hypothesis[10], suggesting that sharing mainly occurs among participating hunters as a reward for their labor and not as an artifact of increased begging effort by hunters, potentially buffering variation in hunting return rates across hunters
A comparative approach to assess whether group hunting and meat sharing are cooperative endeavors in other species and the mechanisms involved will contribute to our understanding of cooperative hunting and theories of selection pressures involved in human evolution
Summary
Cooperative hunting and meat sharing are hypothesized as fundamental to human life history adaptations and biological success. The degree to which chimpanzee hunting behavior is a cooperative act, in the sense that joint participation increases success and that hunters benefit more than bystanders[26], is hotly debated and varies across populations[17,19,27,28]. A growing body of observational and experimental studies in humans suggests that coordinated actions function to prime the motivation and socio-cognition required to jointly pursue goals with partners[32,33], such as synchronous marching before combat[32] It remains unclear whether joint participation in coordinated activity facilitates motivation in joint tasks in non-human animals
Sign-in/Register to view highlights & summary Sign-in/Register to access full text options 
Talk to us
Join us for a 30 min session where you can share your feedback and ask us any queries you have
Schedule a callDisclaimer: All third-party content on this website/platform is and will remain the property of their respective owners and is provided on "as is" basis without any warranties, express or implied. Use of third-party content does not indicate any affiliation, sponsorship with or endorsement by them. Any references to third-party content is to identify the corresponding services and shall be considered fair use under The CopyrightLaw.
