Abstract: Consolation is a triadic postconflict interaction between a conflict participant and an uninvolved third party. The term consolation implies stress alleviation. Consequently, consolation may be an effective mechanism to alleviate postconflict stress. However, this assumption has not been tested. We tested whether consolation alleviates postconflict stress in captive chimpanzees, Pan troglodytes. In addition, we examined whether consolation is a substitute postconflict interaction for reconciliation. We collected 643 postconflict-matched control pairs on aggressees and 576 on aggressors. Consolation occurred equally frequently with aggressees and aggressors. However, we found no evidence that consolation alleviated stress, regardless of the identity of the consoler. In addition, consolation was also directed to conflict participants with no evident postconflict stress. Furthermore, we found no evidence for consolation being a substitute for reconciliation. The occurrence of consolation did not depend on the occurrence of reconciliation and consolation was not more prevalent with the sex class that reconciled less often or had the highest postconflict stress levels. We conclude that consolation is a postconflict interaction in its own right, the function of which is not likely to be connected to stress alleviation of the consoled individual. We propose that the function of triadic postconflict affiliation, previously labelled as consolation, should be reassessed with regard to the third parties' reasons to affiliate with conflict opponents.

Abstract: We describe a series of playback experiments designed to test whether free-ranging baboons, Papio cynocephalus ursinus, recognize the calls of other group members and also associate signallers with their close genetic relatives. Pairs of unrelated females were played sequences of calls that mimicked a fight between their relatives. As controls, the same females heard sequences that involved either (1) only the more dominant female's relative or (2) neither of the females' relatives. When call sequences involved their relatives, subjects looked towards the speaker for a longer duration than when the sequences involved nonkin. When the sequences involved the other female's relative, they also looked towards that female. Subjects did not look towards one another when call sequences involved nonkin. Dominant subjects were more likely to supplant their subordinate partners following playbacks of sequences that mimicked a dispute between their relatives than following the two control trials. In contrast, both subjects were more likely to approach one another and to interact in a friendly manner following the two control trials than following the test trial. Results indicate that female baboons recognize the screams and threat grunts not only of their own close relatives but also of unrelated individuals. They also replicate previous studies in suggesting that female monkeys recognize the close associates of other individuals and adjust their interactions with others according to recent events involving individuals other than themselves. Copyright 1999 The Association for the Study of Animal Behaviour.

Abstract: Cognitive processes such as perception, learning, memory and decision making play an important role in mate choice, foraging and many other behaviours. In this review, I summarize a few key ideas about animal cognition developed in a recent book (Shettleworth 1998, Cognition, Evolution and Behaviour) and briefly review some areas in which interdisciplinary research on animal cognition is currently proving especially productive. Cognition, broadly defined, includes all ways in which animals take in information through the senses, process, retain and decide to act on it. Studying animal cognition does not entail any particular position on whether or to what degree animals are conscious. Neither does it entail rejecting behaviourism in that one of the greatest challenges in studing animal cognition is to formulate clear behavioural criteria for inferring specific mental processes. Tests of whether or not apparently goal-directed behaviour is controlled by a representation of its goal, episodic-like memory in birds, and deceptive behaviour in monkeys provide examples. Functional modelling has been integrated with analyses of cognitive mechanisms in a number of areas, including studies of communication, models of how predator learning and attention affect the evolution of conspicuous and cryptic prey, tests of the relationship betweeen ecological demands on spatial cognition and brain evolution, and in research on social learning. Rather than a `new field' of cognitive ecology, such interdisciplinary research on animal cognition exemplifies a revival of interest in proximate mechanisms of behaviour.

Abstract: The tendency in primate groups for two opponents to affiliate shortly after a fight has been described as dyadic reconciliation. The response has been shown to restore disrupted relationships and curtail ongoing aggression. Rates of self-directed behaviour (e.g. scratching) are positively correlated with anxiety in primates and the rates decline after reconciliation, indicating that the response also functions to reduce postconflict tension. Third parties not involved in an aggressive interaction are also likely to affiliate with one of the combatants subsequent to a fight. Such `triadic' interactions may also promote conflict resolution when, for instance, the relatives of a victim affiliate with their relative's aggressor. Because aggression in a group influences a bystander's behaviour with combatants, we hypothesized that aggression between two animals would also influence a bystander's behaviour with other bystanders. Such `quadratic' postconflict interactions might also function to reduce postconflict tension or occur in patterns among kin subgroups to resolve conflict. We tested for quadratic interactions in an 18-member group of captive hamadryas baboons, Papio hamadryas hamadryas. Immediately following a fight, an uninvolved bystander was randomly selected for observation and its affiliative interactions with other bystanders and its displacement activities were recorded for 3 min. Rates of behaviour during these postconflict periods were compared to rates during 3-min baseline periods not preceded by aggression. Bystanders engaged in quadratic interactions by increasing affiliation with other bystanders following aggression. Bystanders directed affiliation to nonkin bystanders that were their preferred social partners. Displacement activities of bystanders were significantly higher during postconflict intervals compared to baseline intervals, and bystander displacement activity levels before affiliative contact with other bystanders were significantly higher than after contact. Apparently, bystanders become tense or anxious after witnessing aggression and affiliate with preferred partners to reduce the arousal.