Female chimps 'as deadly as males'
Violence could be due to increasing foraging competition
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Tuesday, 15, May 2007 03:44
Evidence that female chimpanzees can be as deadly as their male counterparts has been uncovered by scientists today.
Infanticide - the killing of young - was mainly thought to be a male trait among primates but researchers from the University of St Andrews have discovered a number of instances of female-led infanticide.
In the 1970s scientists noted a case of a female chimpanzee and her daughter who killed at least two offspring of other females. Without other evidence, it was speculated that it was a result of a pathological problem.
But the three cases reported today in the journal Current Biology have led scientists to argue that instances of female-led infanticide are not isolated and are instead a representative part of the female behaviour repertoire in chimpanzees.
The researchers spotted instances of infanticide in the Sonso chimpanzee community in Budongo Forest in Uganda. In two cases the killings were perpetrated by groups of resident females against 'stranger' females from outside the resident group.
It is still not clear what drives this behaviour but the scientists propose that it may in part be due to increased pressure on females competing for foraging areas.
In an accompanying comment in Current Biology, Boston University anthropologist Martin Muller said: "One of the next big challenges. is to understand the extent to which sex differences in violence result from differing motivational thresholds, as opposed to variation in the immediate costs and benefits of competition.
"In the meantime, the myth of the passive female can be laid to rest, alongside her victims."