Do Chimps Who Urinate Together Stay Together?
The New York Times
Scientists suspect that contagious urination, a behavior they observed among a troop of apes in Japan, may play an important role in primate social life.
Ena Onishi, a doctoral student at Kyoto University, has spent over 600 hours watching chimpanzees urinating. She has a good reason for all that peeping, though. She is part of a team of researchers that recently discovered that the primates tend to tinkle when they see nearby chimps do the same.
In a study published Monday in the journal Current Biology, Ms. Onishi and her colleagues described this phenomenon, which they call contagious urination. Their discovery raises questions about the role peeing might play in the social lives of chimps and other primates.
Ms. Onishi first spotted contagious urination in 2019 while observing chimps at the Kumamoto Sanctuary in Kyoto, Japan. “I was observing a group of captive chimpanzees for a different research project, and I noticed that they tended to urinate at the same time,” Ms. Onishi said. “It got me thinking, Could this be one of those contagious behaviors like contagious yawning?” she explained, referring to our innate tendency to yawn upon seeing or hearing others do it.
To find out, Ms. Onishi studied the sanctuary’s 20 chimpanzees, observing them peeing together over 1,300 times. After crunching the numbers, Ms. Onishi and her colleagues realized that the chimps were indeed urinating in rapid succession. They found that the nearer a chimp was to the initial urinator, the more likely it was to join the party. They also discovered that chimps lower on the social ladder were more likely to go when others were going.
“This result was surprising for us,” Ms. Onishi said. “It raised intriguing questions about the social function of this behavior, which has been overlooked for a long time.”
Why the chimps do this remains a mystery, but Ms. Onishi and her colleagues have several hypotheses. “Contagious urination might help reinforce group connections, boosting overall social cohesion,” she said. “It could promote a shared readiness for collective behaviors. There are so many possibilities.”
TikTok’s cultural footprint in America is huge. Why is its disappearance being met with a shrug?
The positions of Robert F. Kennedy Jr. on vaccines and drug companies are well known. His approach to addiction has been far less scrutinized.
Robert F. Kennedy Jr. petitioned the F.D.A. to revoke authorization of the shots at a time when they were in high demand and considered life-saving.
While TikTok remains hugely popular in Brazil, Indonesia and other markets, its 170 million users in the United States are its most valuable.
With Trump back in town, owners are wondering how the dining scene will shape up.
The government is expected to pay lower prices for Ozempic and Wegovy starting in 2027. The Trump administration will decide whether to expand coverage for millions of Americans.
A new study reveals the surprising ways rattlesnakes have evolved to collect water in the desert.
Ahead of a potential ban of the app, The Times spoke to 11 prominent food content creators about what is at stake.
While Elon Musk’s spaceflight company repeated a spectacular catch of its powerful booster stage, the upper stage experienced a catastrophic malfunction.
At a small but growing subset of American breweries, a wave of obscure, foam-heavy Czech beers is swelling.
Although long considered a disease of aging, certain cancers are turning up more often in younger women, according to a new report.
The rocket successfully lifted off after the company’s first launch attempt was scrubbed. The flight is a crucial test of the company’s ability to compete with Elon Musk’s SpaceX.
A 28-year-old woman with a busy social life spends hours on end talking to her A.I. boyfriend for advice and consolation. And yes, they do have sex.
New York may be losing its identity as the city that doesn’t sleep, but the motley guests at Kellogg’s Diner show the spirit is still wide awake.
Analysis found that more than 64,000 Palestinians may have been killed by traumatic injury in the first nine months of the war.
Robotic vehicles from Firefly Aerospace of Texas and Ispace of Japan launched from the same SpaceX rocket early Wednesday and will soon part ways. Both are aiming for the lunar surface.
Regulators filed a lawsuit in federal court stemming from Mr. Musk’s $44 billion purchase of the social media company now called X.
With a tool often used in the study of dinosaur fossils, scientists uncovered new details in ornate tattoos on the skin of members of the Chancay culture of Peru.