The hypothesis that allogrooming functions as a tension-reduction mechanism was tested. Tension was measured by the frequency of displacement activities by an animal. Two adult male and 11 adult female Java (or long-tailed) monkeys (Macuca fusciculuris) that were relatively unfamiliar with each other were paired 1 hour per day for five consecutive days during the periovulatory portion of the menstrual cycle. Female allogrooming was found to reduce the frequency of male displacement activities both during the course of interaction and outside it, and this decrease was proportional to the amount of allogrooming received. Female allogrooming did not, however, exert long-lasting effects on the frequency of female displacement activities. An increase in the frequency of male displacement activities was recorded during the 10-second interval immediately after the end of the female allogrooming bouts. Neither postinhibitory rebound nor frustration owing to the cessation of a pleasant situation, i.e., the two advanced explanatory hypotheses, accounted for this increase. The results of the present study concur with physiological findings that support the tension-reduction hypothesis. The social function of allogrooming appears quite important and is entirely compatible with the functional hypothesis that emphasizes hygiene.

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OBJECTIVE: To describe some biological, behavioural and psychological correlates of the Three-Factor Eating Questionnaire, and to determine the relationship between dietary restraint, binge eating, and leptin among obese women seeking treatment. DESIGN: Consecutive series of obese women enrolled in a clinical program for weight reduction treatment. SUBJECTS: Forty-two obese women. Eight participants met the criteria for`severe binge eating' as measured by the Binge Eating Scale. MEASUREMENTS: Energy intake, resting energy expenditure, body composition, leptin, restraint, disinhibition, hunger and binge eating were assessed before starting the treatment. RESULTS: In this sample both higher disinhibition and hunger scores were associated with greater binge eating severity. Obese women with severe binge eating had lower restraint, higher disinhibition and hunger scores, as well as higher daily fat intake, when compared with obese non-binge-eaters. Interestingly, restraint scores were negatively associated with leptin levels among subjects with severe binge eating. CONCLUSION: In obese women with severe binge eating, the negative relationship between dietary restraint and serum leptin concentrations seems mediated by a greater fat intake. These ®ndings need to be veri®ed in further human studies.

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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.