Advertisement

Study: Chimps are natural born killers

"People have long been interested in chimps as a way to better understand the evolution of human behavior," explained Michael L. Wilson.

By Brooks Hays
A male chimpanzee shouts. (CC/Tamboko the Jaguar)
A male chimpanzee shouts. (CC/Tamboko the Jaguar)

MINNEAPOLIS, Sept. 17 (UPI) -- Chimpanzees haven't been playing too many shoot-em-up video games; violence is just in their nature. That's the conclusion drawn from a new study undertaken by scientists at the University of Minnesota and published this week in the journal Nature.

While no biologists have suggested video games were responsible for chimpanzees' sometimes-lethal aggression, some have surmised that human pressures -- like clear cutting forests or feeding wild chimps bananas -- promote intraspecies violence. Others suggest violence is just their nature, an adaptive tool and form of behavior that offers evolutionary advantages.

Advertisement

Now, new research offers credence to the latter position. Researchers from Minnesota conducted their study with the help of wildlife officials and scientists throughout Africa. They scoured several decades worth of chimp research. In doing so, the team of biologists were able to document instances of violence among chimpanzee populations over time.

Researchers found levels of violence were consistent and uninfluenced by the amount of human pressure. Bonobo populations, which are much more peaceful in nature, served as a constant -- their less violent nature also remained unaffected by levels of human interference.

"People have long been interested in chimps as a way to better understand the evolution of human behavior," explained Michael L. Wilson, the study's lead author.

Advertisement

And though the study is conclusive about one thing, that chimps are naturally violent and often conduct gang attacks, many questions remain unanswered.

"It's still an open question whether this sort of violence is something that has happened continuously in human evolutionary history, or whether it arose independently in humans and chimps," Wilson said. "Perhaps our common ancestor, which we believe lived 5 to 7 million years ago, also had high rates of violence, too."

Regardless of how violence evolved, the reality of chimp and human violence remains. Both humans and chimps offer a mirror to the other. Just as violence among chimps remains common, gang-like violence and war continues to plague the human species. In 2013, there were 33 armed state-level conflicts. In 2012, there were 506 homicides in the city of Chicago.

"Males kill more often than females in both species, and humans and chimpanzees share an unusual pattern of cooperating to kill," Wilson told Discovery News.

Latest Headlines