Experiment gives rise to social conventions between baboons

Date:
December 13, 2021
Source:
CNRS
Summary:
A research team has demonstrated that members of a group of
baboons can establish shared social conventions -- in this case,
by all agreeing on how to solve a problem in order to get a reward
faster. This is the first time that such conventions have been
studied experimentally in an animal species.



FULL STORY ========================================================================== Kissing, shaking hands, or bowing are three possible ways of saying
hello or goodbye. These gestures are social conventions: known to all individuals in a group, they allow one to address greetings quickly
and appropriately.

Conventions help solve coordination "problems" frequently encountered
by the group, by providing efficient, stable and arbitrary solutions.


==========================================================================
But conventions are not unique to the human species, as proven for
the first time by the results of an experiment conducted at the CNRS primatology centre in Rousset-sur-Arc by researchers from the Cognitive Psychology Laboratory (CNRS/Aix-Marseille Universite'). Presented with
a device requiring the coordination of two individuals, Guinea baboons established common rules for the whole group in about three days.

The baboons were presented with the following task: two different images
were randomly selected from a set and presented on screens to two
monkeys. If they wanted a reward, the baboons had to choose the same
picture, meaning there was not one possible answer to the experiment,
but several. Individuals had to decide together on a solution to the
problem and agree on the choices to be made.

The primates quickly developed a hierarchy between images: for example,
they agreed on the choice of the pink square when it was presented
with a light blue square, and chose the yellow square next to a pink or
light blue square. When the two baboons could no longer see each other,
the overall performance of the group was hardly affected. This suggests
that the baboons were not simply using imitation as a strategy to solve
this problem, but had instead coordinated on these choices.

These conventions between baboons are stable over time, efficient, and arbitrary since the choice of images was not dictated. They therefore
present the three characteristics of human social conventions. The
scientists propose that groups of non-human primates in the wild be
observed in new ways to detect such conventions.

========================================================================== Story Source: Materials provided by CNRS. Note: Content may be edited
for style and length.


========================================================================== Journal Reference:
1. Anthony Formaux, Dany Paleressompoulle, Joe"l Fagot, Nicolas
Claidie`re.

The experimental emergence of convention in a non-human primate.

Philosophical Transactions of the Royal Society B: Biological
Sciences, 2021; 377 (1843) DOI: 10.1098/rstb.2020.0310 ==========================================================================

Link to news story: https://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2021/12/211213121810.htm

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