Related Experiment Video
Updated: Jul 29, 2025

Assessment of Social Cognition in Non-human Primates Using a Network of Computerized Automated Learning Device ALDM Test Systems
Published on: May 5, 2015
Social network inheritance and differentiation in wild baboons
Vittoria Roatti1,2, Guy Cowlishaw2, Elise Huchard3
1Anthropology Department, University College London, London WC1E 6BT, UK.
Abstract:
Immatures' social development may be fundamental to understand important biological processes, such as social information transmission through groups, that can vary with age and sex. Our aim was to determine how social networks change with age and differ between sexes in wild immature baboons, group-living primates that readily learn socially. Our results show that immature baboons inherited their mothers' networks and differentiated from them as they aged, increasing their association with partners of similar age and the same sex. Males were less bonded to their matriline and became more peripheral with age compared to females. Our results may pave the way to further studies testing a new hypothetical framework: in female-philopatric societies, social information transmission may be constrained at the matrilineal level by age- and sex-driven social clustering.
Related Concept Videos
Relationship Formation
Inclusive Fitness
Social Exchange Theory
Types of Genetic Transfer Between Organisms
Socioemotional Development during Infancy
Primary Temperament Types
Evolutionary Psychology

