This article reports on a nonexperimentally induced case of infant abuse by a Japanese macaque mother. The case is of particular interest because of the circumstances under which the abuse occurred. The mother in the present case was born and reared in the wild and was living in a stable social group at the time of delivery-unlike the conditions in most previous reports. In addition, there are unusual findings from the quantitative study of the maternal behavior outside of the abuse.Most of the information currently available on infant abuse in nonhuman primates comes from the work of Harlow and his associates, Several of their studies of the longterm effects of rearing experiences were expressly aimed at investigating the consequences of early social deprivation on later maternal behavior (see the review by Ruppenthal, Arling, Harlow, Sackett, & Suomi, 1976). These laboratory studies, conducted on rhesus monkeys, were based on experimental manipulation. Therefore, an unusually high number of subjects could be studied and the influence of many variables could be assessed.Because the present article is a case study it suffers from the limitations of naturalistic research; however, it deals with aspects of the phenomenon that have not been investigated previously and that are generally thought to be inconsistent with infant abuse. Most previous reports of infant neglect/abuse by macaque mothers involved cases where the mother was socially incompetent as a result of (a) inadequate early social experience, (b) living alone at the time of the birth, or (c) living in an unstable social group. In contrast,We are greatly indebted to G. Gray Eaton, Associate Scientist at the Oregon Regional Primate Research Center, Masumi Satoo, Mayor of Oita City, Japan, and Tsuriahide Shidei, Director of $ie Japan Monkey Centre, who provided us with valuable unpublished information. We thank them very much.
ABSTRACT. Three different quantitative parameters (frequency, duration and distribution) were used for studying allogrooming behavior in and outside the mating season in a Japanese macaque social group confined at the Rome Zoo. On the whole, 106 hr of observations were made using an"all occurrences" recording technique. Although individual grooming scores were collected, the quantitative analyses were mostly focused on the relationships between and within the age/sex classes. The mating season caused two basic changes in allogrooming: (1) an amount increase; and (2) a widening of individuals' range of interactions. Strikingly, the former variation proved to be widely independent of the latter. Relationships between the age/sex classes changed so that the mature females became the main target of grooming from other group members, male and female. On the contrary, two interactional trends did not seem to be affected by the mating season: the tendencies to groom agemates chiefly and to interact with relatives closely. However, the reorganization of grooming relationships did not appear to weaken the group cohesion.
In a group of Japanese macaques, a multiparous high‐ranking female gave birth to an infant and, two days later, adopted a neonate abandoned right after birth by a primiparous low‐ranking female. Both infants were reared successfully. Whereas the “selfish” explanation does not accord with the evidence from the present case, the “altruistic” explanation cannot be discarded definitively. However, the context and the consequences of the adoption suggest reproductive error on the part of the adoptive mother as the most likely explanation.
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