Abstract
Reconciliation is the most extensively studied conflict resolution mechanism in animal societies. However, despite the extensive literature on this topic, behaviors considered to represent postconflict affiliation have not been consistent across studies of reconciliation. Critically, reconciliation is usually defined as postconflict contact affiliation, e.g., grooming, and the importance of including interopponent distance regulation is often neglected. Moreover, to date, no study has simultaneously investigated different behavioral forms of reconciliation. We tested in two groups of wild Barbary macaques (Macaca sylvanus) the relative importance of postconflict close proximity and grooming in the mediation of two important costs of aggression: damage to the opponent’s social relationship and elevated postconflict anxiety. We provide evidence that close-proximity approaches function to resolve conflicts: Close-proximity approaches reduced the victim’s postconflict anxiety and were predicted by the quality of the social relationship with the opponent. Moreover, postconflict grooming alone, although predicted by the quality of the opponent’s social relationship, did not influence the victim’s elevated postconflict anxiety. Our results suggest that interopponent distance regulation plays an important role in reconciling the costs of aggression in Barbary macaques. We advocate that further efforts should be made to test which behaviors play a role in conflict resolution in different species. This is important because even closely related species may differ in the function of behaviors that superficially appear to be rather similar. Moreover, the choice of behaviors used to study conflict resolution determines the frequency with which reconciliation is observed and can thus bias comparisons across species.
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Acknowledgments
We thank Mohamed Qarro for his support in the field; the Commissariat aux Eaux et Forêts et à la Lutte Contre la Désertification of Morocco for research permission; and Chris Young, Laëtitia Maréchal, Pawel Fedurek, and Paolo Piedimonte for assistance in data collection. We thank Joanna Setchell and two anonymous reviewers for their useful comments on our manuscript.
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McFarland, R., Majolo, B. The Importance of Considering the Behavioral Form of Reconciliation in Studies of Conflict Resolution. Int J Primatol 34, 15–29 (2013). https://doi.org/10.1007/s10764-012-9643-y
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s10764-012-9643-y