Jun 18 2008
Female chimpanzees play a subtle mating game
From the Guardian:
British psychologists working in the forests of western Uganda have recorded the first evidence of sexual politics influencing the mating calls of our closest primate ancestors.
Researchers spent 10 months in the Budongo forest observing and recording calls from a community of 78 chimpanzees, only eight of whom were adult males.
They found that chimpanzees varied wildly in the extent of their calls during mating, but noticed a pattern that had never been spotted before. Audio recordings revealed that females were more vocal during sex if there were other high-ranking males around, but that they toned the noise down significantly when aggressive females were nearby.
The findings suggest that chimpanzees are able to use their calls for more complex social communication than previously thought.
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