Altruism in animals

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Altruism is a well-documented animal behaviour, which appears most obviously in kin relationships but may also be evident amongst wider social groups.

1 Overview
2 Implications in evolutionary theory
3 Examples of animal altruism
4 See also
5 References
6 External links

[edit] Overview

See also: Ethics and evolutionary psychology

In the science of ethology (the study of behavior), and more generally in the study of social evolution, altruism refers to behavior by an individual that increases the fitness of another individual while decreasing the fitness of the actor.^[1]. Research in evolutionary theory has been applied to social behaviour, including altruism. Some animal altruistic behaviour is explained by kin selection. Beyond the physical exertions that mothers, and in some species fathers, undertake to protect their young, extreme examples of sacrifice may occur. One example is matriphagy (the consumption of the mother by her offspring) in the spider Stegodyphus. Hamilton's rule describes the benefit of such altruism in terms of Wright's coefficient of relationship to the beneficiary and the benefit granted to the beneficiary minus the cost to the sacrificer. Should this sum be greater than zero a fitness gain will result from the sacrifice.

When apparent altruism is not between kin, it may be based on reciprocity. A monkey will present its back to another monkey, who will pick out parasites; after a time the roles will be reversed. Such reciprocity will pay off, in evolutionary terms, as long as the costs of helping are less than the benefits of being helped and as long as animals will not gain in the long run by "cheating" - that is to say, by receiving favours without returning them. This is elaborated on in evolutionary game theory and specifically the prisoner's dilemma as social theory.

[edit] Implications in evolutionary theory

Researchers on alleged altruist behaviours among animals have been ideologically opposed to the social darwinist concept of the "survival of the fittest", under the name of "survival of the nicest" — the latter being globally compatible, however, with darwinist' theory of evolution. Insistence on such cooperative behaviours between animals was first exposed by the Russian zoologist and anarchist Peter Kropotkin in his 1902 book, Mutual Aid: A Factor of Evolution.

Recent developments in game theory (look into ultimatum game) have provided some explanations for apparent altruism, as have traditional evolutionary analyses. Among the proposed mechanisms are:

Behavioural manipulation (for example, by certain parasites that can alter the behavior of the host)
Bounded rationality (for example, Herbert Simon)
Conscience
Kin selection including eusociality (see also "The Selfish Gene")
Memes (by influencing behavior to favour their own spread, for example, religion)
Reciprocal altruism, mutual aid
Sexual selection, in particular, the Handicap principle
Reciprocity (social psychology)
- Indirect reciprocity (for example, reputation)
- Strong reciprocity^[2]
Pseudo-reciprocity

The study of altruism was the initial impetus behind George R. Price's development of the Price equation which is a mathematical equation used to study genetic evolution. An interesting example of altruism is found in the cellular slime moulds, such as Dictyostelium mucoroides. These protists live as individual amoebae until starved, at which point they aggregate and form a multicellular fruiting body in which some cells sacrifice themselves to promote the survival of other cells in the fruiting body. Social behavior and altruism share many similarities to the interactions between the many parts (cells, genes) of an organism, but are distinguished by the ability of each individual to reproduce indefinitely without an absolute requirement for its neighbors.

Jorge Moll and Jordan Grafman, neuroscientists at the National Institutes of Health and LABS-D'Or Hospital Network (J.M.) provided the first evidence for the neural bases of altruistic giving in normal healthy volunteers, using functional magnetic resonance imaging. In their research, published in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences USA in October, 2006,^[3] they showed that both pure monetary rewards and charitable donations activated the mesolimbic reward pathway, a primitive part of the brain that usually lights up in response to food and sex. However, when volunteers generously placed their interests of others before their own by making charitable donations, another brain circuit was selectively activated: the subgenual cortex/septal region. These structures are intimately related to social attachment and bonding in other species. Altruism, the experiment suggested, was not a superior moral faculty that suppresses basic selfish urges but rather was basic to the brain, hard-wired and pleasurable.^[4]

A new study by Samuel Bowles at the Santa Fe Institute in New Mexico, US, is seen by some as breathing new life into the model of group selection for Altruism, known as "Survival of the nicest". Bowles conducted a genetic analysis of contemporary foraging groups, including Australian aboriginals, native Siberian Inuit populations and indigenous tribal groups in Africa. It was found that hunter-gatherer bands of up to 30 individuals were considerably more closely related than was previously thought. Under these conditions, thought to be similar to those of the middle and upper Paleolithic, altruism towards other group-members would improve the overall fitness of the group.

If an individual defended the group but was killed, any genes that the individual shared with the overall group would still be passed on. Early customs such as food sharing or monogamy could have levelled out the “cost” of altruistic behaviour, in the same way that income taxes redistribute income in society. He assembled genetic, climactic, archaeological, ethnographic and experimental data to examine the cost-benefit relationship of human cooperation in ancient populations. In his model, members of a group bearing genes for altruistic behaviour pay a "tax" by limiting their reproductive opportunities to benefit from sharing food and information, thereby increasing the average fitness of the group as well as their inter-relatedness. Bands of altruistic humans would then act together to gain resources from other groups at this challenging time in history.^[5].

Altruist theories in evolutionary biology were contested by Amotz Zahavi, the inventor of the signal theory and its correlative, the handicap principle, based mainly on his observations of the Arabian Babbler, a bird commonly known for its surprising (alleged) altruistic behaviours.

[edit] Examples of animal altruism

Dogs often adopt orphaned cats, squirrels, ducks and even tigers.^[6]

Dolphins support sick or injured animals, swimming under them for hours at a time and pushing them to the surface so they can breathe.^{[citation needed]}

Wolves and wild dogs bring meat back to members of the pack not present at the kill.^{[citation needed]}

Male baboons threaten predators and cover the rear as the troop retreats.^{[citation needed]}

Gibbons and chimpanzees with food will, in response to a gesture, share their food with others of the group.^{[citation needed]}. Chimpanzees will help other humans and Conspecifics without any reward in return^[7]

Bonobos have been observed aiding injured or handicapped bonobos.^[8]

According to the research of Gerald Wilkinson, vampire bats have a "buddy system" in which a bat who has had a successful night of feeding will regurgitate blood for its less fortunate companion.^[9]

In numerous bird species, a breeding pair receives support in raising its young from other "helper" birds, including help with the feeding of its fledglings.^[10] Some will even go as far as protecting an unrelated bird's young from predators ^[11]

Most mammal carnivores like wolves or dogs have a habit of not harming pack members below certain age, of opposite sex or in surrendering position (in case of some animals, the behavior exists within entire species rather than one pack).^{[citation needed]}

Vervet Monkeys give alarm calls to warn fellow monkeys of the presence of predators, even though in doing so they attract attention to themselves, increasing their personal chance of being attacked.^{[citation needed]}