Monkey expresses emotions like humans

Researchers have recently discovered similarities in emotional development between a bonobo monkey in a conservation area in Africa and young children, in which the monkey has the ability to regulate emotions like children. people.

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Dr Zanna Clay and Frans de Waal from the National Primate Research Center, Emory University, conducted research at bonobo monkey sanctuary near Kinshasa, the capital of the Democratic Republic of Congo.

The video of daily analysis of monkeys in the reserve allows the two researchers to evaluate the expression of bonobos' emotions as well as how they react to the emotions of others. They discovered that bonobos could recover quickly and easily after emotional changes.

For example, after losing in a fight, the monkeys exhibited more sympathy with the same species. These monkeys also often show affection actions such as touching, hugging, kissing monkeys when they experience grief.

Bonobo monkey consoled another monkey after "losing the battle".(Photo: Zanna Clay)

Genetically, bonobo monkeys (Pan paniscus), one of the closest human primates, have many similarities with humans similar to chimpanzees. Bonobos are also considered to be the largest monkeys that are able to show the most obvious empathy.

"This finding suggests that bonobos can become the most ideal animal to make psychological comparisons. Any fundamental similarities between humans and bonobo monkeys can help make a mark. The traces of a common ancestor lived about 6 million years ago, " Wall's Science Daily quoted.

If the bonobo monkey's expression of emotion predicts how they exhibit reactions to other children, this could be called emotional regulation or the ability to calm angry emotions or avoid the impact. stimulated . In children, emotional regulation is important for social personality development.

Bonobo monkey sanctuary in this study has many monkeys who are victims of wild animal hunting. The monkeys were cared for by the reserve park staff instead of the mother monkey from a young age until they were large enough and transferred to the live forest with monkeys of the same age. Compared to the monkeys cared for by the mother monkey, the abandoned monkeys often find it more difficult to regulate emotions, they are more likely to feel uncomfortable and often scream a few minutes after a match. that happens.

By assessing how to express suffering and respond to external influences, researchers can affirm emotional regulation as an essential part of empathy. Empathy allows monkeys to understand the suffering of other beings without hurting themselves, like humans. This explains why abandoned bonobo monkeys, once having experiences that easily make them vulnerable, will be hampered emotional development, socially less able to express themselves than others.

This is an important finding for human evolutionary history because it can show that the social emotional expression patterns applied to children have the same effect on monkeys. With the application of this pattern, researchers can examine the behavioral predictions of adult monkeys.