Abstract
In a number of primate species, daughters have a dominance rank adjacent to their mother's, and younger sisters dominate older ones. The acquisition of a dominance rank largely independent of body size has been related to the reception of help in contests. This paper concentrates on a three-stage process. (1) Vulnerable individuals are helped in contests. (2) The more successfully helped individuals challenge and, with help, eventually dominate less successfully helped ones who are relatively close to them in size. (3) The rank so acquired is reinforced by continued help after dominance is achieved. This hypothesis is substantiated by data from two groups of wild gorillas. In them, only the first stage of help occurred: 94% of incidents were to protect vulnerable kin. Lacking the second two stages, dominance rank remained closely proportional to body size. Help in contests increases the complexity of calculations of asymmetry in competitive ability. Since such help is far more commonly seen among primates than nonprimates, it is possible that it was a main selection pressure in the evolution of primate intelligence.
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