2024-07-22 10:08:07
Their playful behavior showed that the pair share a friendly bond. But can animals really be friends like humans?
Certain behaviors of many species of social animals suggest that individuals may indeed be closer to each other than to others (without close relatives or mates). Male dolphins that feed on sponges interact with other males, which have a similar feeding style. Elephants greet other elephants they know in a specific way. Primates form close relationships with non-relatives demonstrates while making love. Fighting birds are also known to love other fighting birds in their flock, embracing them with their beaks.
“Individuals form social relationships to navigate the environment,” says Delphine De Moor, Ph.D. in behavioral ecology at the University of Exeter in the United Kingdom. Highly social animals maintain relationships of varying degrees of trust and intimacy, she said. These relationships are shaped by interaction patterns. Trust grows when repeated interactions are positive.
If animals can form stable, long-lasting and mutually beneficial bonds that are characteristic of human friendships, “then we see friendship in the animal kingdom as well,” says Dr. D. De Moor.
According to Catherine Crockford, director of research at the French National Center for Scientific Research (CNRS) in Lyon and head of the Great Ape Social Mind Laboratory, researchers studying primates have found that neurochemistry plays an important role in strengthening such connections.
During primate courtship, the behavior-regulating hormone oxytocin is released, “which then goes into the reward center, probably providing positive feedback to make courting more likely,” Crockford explains. Making love to a friend also lowers the stress-related hormone cortisol. In contrast, cortisol levels do not change when the monkeys make love to a member of the group with whom they have not formed a bond, the scientist points out.
“There seems to be a physiological benefit to doing something like making love to a partner with whom you have a bond,” she says.
Scientists first learned about reciprocal friendships in primates by observing groups of monkeys, but over the past few decades, more and more evidence has emerged of friendships and their benefits among other mammals, Crockford says.
“Individuals who manage to maintain such strong relationships end up living longer, having more offspring, and experiencing less stress,” she says. “It really seems like if you’re able to have that kind of relationship, it’s very beneficial.”
For example, orcas share food and information about where to find food. Orcas with strong bonds within their group are less likely to starve when resources are scarce. Hyenas with more friends tend to be more successful in their clans because they have a backup option for social challenges.
But with friendship comes responsibility, notes D. de Moor. “At a certain point, animals are willing to take much greater risks for their preferred social partners,” she says.
Let’s remember the self-sacrifice of the vampire bat by helping a hungry friend, sharing a recently eaten meal and pouring blood into the friend’s mouth.
Friendship bonds can be so strong among chimpanzees that if the mother dies and leaves behind an infant that is not yet independent, then the male or female, [tėvų] friend, can adopt that offspring.
And raising a baby is expensive for new parents, especially if the adopter is male.
“His overall pace of life slows down,” Crockford says. “He has to carry the young or walk at their speed, share the nest with them at night, and he can’t easily engage in group interactions or aggressive interactions with others.”
Friendship between species
Mutual trust can also occur between different animal species. in 2022 A ground-breaking study has shown that wild chimpanzees and gorillas in the Republic of Congo can cross the species barrier and form friendships that last 20 years or more.
In some cases, animal friendships develop through human intervention. Cats and dogs living in the same household often form close bonds. A family of orangutans have become friends with a family of otters at a private zoo in Belgium after zookeepers merged their habitats. A lion and a dog that grew up together in Mexico (the lion was illegally kept as a pet) remained close even after both were transferred to an animal rescue facility.
Although the playful friendship between a badger and a coyote has never been observed in California, de Moor says such interspecies relationships may be more common in the wild than scientists suspect. Much more is known about friendships in some groups of animals, such as primates, elephants, and dolphins, simply because their social behavior has been observed for decades, and some relationships are studied throughout the animals’ lifetimes.
“We only know what we study, and we don’t know what we don’t study,” concludes the researcher.
Crockford notes that the evidence for companionship in animals (especially primates) generally reveals the evolution that shaped the human capacity for companionship. Our last common ancestor with apes lived about 25 million years ago. years—so the neurochemistry that determines human friendship and related behavior has been around for millions of years.
“These mechanisms are deep and ancient. In this day and age, when there are other things that people can prioritize over friendship — like money, fame, or likes — it’s a really nice reminder that an essential part of our nature is to have friends.” And that if we are able to have friends and take care of them seriously, we will live longer, be healthier and experience less stress”, says the researcher.
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2024-07-22 10:08:07