Rearing history and allostatic load in adult western lowland gorillas (<i>Gorilla gorilla gorilla</i>) in human care

Edes, Ashley N.; Wolfe, Barbara A.; Crews, Douglas E.

doi:10.1002/zoo.21270

Cited by 15 publications

(13 citation statements)

References 61 publications

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“…(Goymann & Wingfield, 2004 g., cortisol, interleukin-6, and epinephrine) in a study on aging among free-ranging rhesus macaques and incorporated allostasis theory to discuss their results. To date, however, only one study group has constructed a multibiomarker ALI and used it to test for associations with other study variables (e.g., sex, age, and mortality risk) in the manner reported for human samples (Edes, Wolfe, & Crews, 2016a, 2016b.…”

Section: Allostatic Load During Growth a N D De V E L O P Me N Tmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…Survival analysis indicated higher allostatic load was associated significantly with mortality risk when age was included as a covariate. In a follow-up study, associations between rearing history and adult allostatic load were examined in the same sample because disrupted rearing in primates likely influences allostasis and allostatic load similar to how adverse early environments affect children (Edes et al, 2016b). Gorillas were categorized as mother-reared, wildcaught, or nursery-reared.…”

Section: Allostatic Load During Growth a N D De V E L O P Me N Tmentioning

confidence: 99%

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Allostatic load and biological anthropology

Edes

Crews

2017

American J Phys Anthropol

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Multiple stressors affect developing and adult organisms, thereby partly structuring their phenotypes. Determining how stressors influence health, well-being, and longevity in human and nonhuman primate populations are major foci within biological anthropology. Although much effort has been devoted to examining responses to multiple environmental and sociocultural stressors, no holistic metric to measure stress-related physiological dysfunction has been widely applied within biological anthropology. Researchers from disciplines outside anthropology are using allostatic load indices (ALIs) to estimate such dysregulation and examine life-long outcomes of stressor exposures, including morbidity and mortality. Following allostasis theory, allostatic load represents accumulated physiological and somatic damage secondary to stressors and senescent processes experienced over the lifespan. ALIs estimate this wear-and-tear using a composite of biomarkers representing neuroendocrine, cardiovascular, metabolic, and immune systems. Across samples, ALIs are associated significantly with multiple individual characteristics (e.g., age, sex, education, DNA variation) of interest within biological anthropology. They also predict future outcomes, including aspects of life history variation (e.g., survival, lifespan), mental and physical health, morbidity and mortality, and likely health disparities between groups, by stressor exposures, ethnicity, occupations, and degree of departure from local indigenous life ways and integration into external and commodified ones. ALIs also may be applied to similar stress-related research areas among nonhuman primates. Given the reports from multiple research endeavors, here we propose ALIs may be useful for assessing stressors, stress responses, and stress-related dysfunction, current and long-term cognitive function, health and well-being, and risk of early mortality across many research programs within biological anthropology. K E Y W O R D Saging, allostasis, frailty, growth and development, nonhuman primates, senescence, stress | I N T R O D U C T I O NTraditional research foci within biological anthropology include variations in stress, morbidity, and mortality (for reviews, see Ice & James, 2007;Little, 2010). Despite this long-term focus, the field continues to pursue a reliable, relatively easy to apply metric for assessing lifetime stress and stress-related outcomes. We suggest incorporating the theory of allostasis and methods for assessing allostatic load within anthropological theory and methodology to aid in closing this gap. As a theory, allostasis was developed to explain how mammalian physiological responses to stressors in their environments evolved to maximize the probability of survival while limiting somatic damage (Korte, Koolhaas, Wingfield, & McEwen, 2005;McEwen & Stellar, 1993;McEwen & Wingfield, 2003;Sterling, 2004Sterling, , 2012Sterling & Eyer, 1988). Unfortunately, such beneficial defensive responses come at a cost and, over time, repeated allostatic activi...

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Section: Allostatic Load During Growth a N D De V E L O P Me N Tmentioning

confidence: 99%

Section: Allostatic Load During Growth a N D De V E L O P Me N Tmentioning

confidence: 99%

Allostatic load and biological anthropology

Edes

Crews

2017

American J Phys Anthropol

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“…In primatology, early research examined attachment theory primarily through maternal deprivation and early life trauma (Harlow, 1958; Suomi, 1997). Recent research takes a lifespan perspective, examining how early rearing history and maternal loss shape lifetime health and social competency (Edes, Wolfe, & Crews, 2016; Freeman & Ross, 2014; Freeman, Weiss, & Ross, 2016; Tung, Archie, Altmann, & Alberts, 2016).…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

From maternal tending to adolescent befriending: The adolescent transition of social support

Rodrigues

Sanford

Rogers

et al. 2019

American J Primatol

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Attachment theory holds that parental relationships have lifelong effects on offspring social lives. The tend-and-befriend hypothesis posits that female friendships among humans evolved as part of a primate-wide coping mechanism to mediate stress by relying on social support. Here we bridge developmental and evolutionary frameworks to examine adolescent girls' perception of their reliance on female friendship for social support, how perceptions of parental relationships affect peer relationships, and the extent to which parent and peer relationships buffer depressive symptoms. We predict perceived maternal relationship quality will be positively associated with close female friendships, and maternal relationships, paternal relationships, and female friendship will buffer depressive symptoms. Participants were adolescent girls from a summer science camp (N = 95). Participants filled out demographic information, social network surveys, the Parent-Adolescent Communication Scale, and the Center for Epidemiology Depression Scale. Data was analyzed with Pearson's correlations, t tests, and path analysis. Adolescent girls with few female friends, compared with girls who had more than two very close female friends, experienced more depressive symptoms (t = 3.382, p = .001, D = 0.784). Adolescent girls with few female friends experienced more depressive symptoms compared to girls with two or more very close female friends (t = 3.382, p = .001, D = 0.784). Stronger maternal and paternal relationships were associated with having more female friends (maternal: t = −3.213, p = .003, D = 0.837; paternal: t = −2.432; p = .017). In the path analysis model, only maternal relationship quality significantly predicted female friendship category (β = .33, CR = 2.770, p < .006). Furthermore, participants with two or more very close female friends and higher paternal relationship quality had significantly fewer depressive symptoms (friends; β = −.19, CR = −2.112, p = .035; paternal: β = −.33, CR = −3.220, p < .001), and older participants had more depressive symptoms (β = .17, CR = −1.931, p = .036). These results provide additional support for the tend-and-befriend hypothesis, suggesting that maternal tending sets the stage for close female friendships.

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“…Herein, we explore whether updating our original ALIs to include cholesterol and triglycerides better predicts risk of all-cause morbidity, cardiac disease, and mortality in gorillas. We hope this report will build on the foundation of our previous research [65][66][67][68] to help guide those interested in pioneering allostatic load methodology across taxa. As the ability to measure physiological markers from noninvasive tissue samples like urine and feces increases, this research also may extend to studying and monitoring populations in the wild.…”

Section: Allostatic Load Indices With Cholesterol and Triglycerides Pmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…We estimated allostatic load scores using both the original 1-tailed quartile method 20 as well as a multimethod approach we piloted in gorillas [65][66][67][68] that incorporates the philosophy behind using 2-tailed deciles (for a review of allostatic load methodology, see 19 ). With the quartile method, the distribution of each biomarker is divided into quartiles and 1 quartile is designated as high risk; as physiological dysregulation is reflected in low levels of albumin and DHEA-S, their first quartile was designated as high risk, and vice versa for all other biomarkers.…”

Section: Allostatic Load Indexmentioning

confidence: 99%

Allostatic Load Indices With Cholesterol and Triglycerides Predict Disease and Mortality Risk in Zoo-Housed Western Lowland Gorillas (Gorilla gorilla gorilla)

et al. 2020

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Allostatic load, or the physiological dysregulation accumulated due to senescence and stress, is an established predictor of human morbidity and mortality and has been proposed as a tool for monitoring health and welfare in captive wildlife. It is estimated by combining biomarkers from multiple somatic systems into allostatic load indices (ALIs), providing a score representing overall physiological dysregulation. Such ALIs have been shown to predict disease and mortality risk in western lowland gorillas. In these prior analyses, we were unable to include lipid markers, a potential limitation as they are key biomarkers in human models. Recently, we were able to assay serum cholesterol and triglycerides and add them to our previous ALI. We then re-examined associations with health outcomes using binomial generalized linear models. We constructed ALIs using 2 pooling strategies and 2 methods. By itself, a 1-unit increase in allostatic load was associated with higher odds of all-cause morbidity and mortality, but results were mixed for cardiac disease. However, the best fit models for all-cause morbidity and cardiac disease included only age and sex. Allostatic load was retained alongside age in the best fit models for mortality, with a 1-unit increase associated with 23% to 45% higher odds of death. Compared with previous results, ALIs containing cholesterol and triglycerides better predict disease risk in zoo-housed western lowland gorillas, as evidenced by larger effect sizes for some models and better goodness of fit for all ALIs. Based on these results, we address methodology for future allostatic load research on wildlife.

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Rearing history and allostatic load in adult western lowland gorillas (Gorilla gorilla gorilla) in human care

Cited by 15 publications

References 61 publications

Allostatic load and biological anthropology

Allostatic load and biological anthropology

From maternal tending to adolescent befriending: The adolescent transition of social support

Allostatic Load Indices With Cholesterol and Triglycerides Predict Disease and Mortality Risk in Zoo-Housed Western Lowland Gorillas (Gorilla gorilla gorilla)

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