Overdorff D J
Department of Anthropology, University of Texas-Austin, 78712, USA.
Am J Phys Anthropol. 1998 Feb;105(2):153-66. doi: 10.1002/(SICI)1096-8644(199802)105:2<153::AID-AJPA4>3.0.CO;2-W.
Strong social relationships have been reported between adult male and female prosimian primates in the genera Eulemur and Varecia and have been referred to as "pair-bonding." It has been hypothesized that females benefit from these affiliative relationships with an adult male by having protection against infanticidal males, implying that the male member of the dyad also is the father of her offspring. I evaluated this hypothesis and whether or not the term pair-bond was appropriate by using field data collected on two groups of Eulemur fulvus rufus in southeastern Madagascar. Four predictions were tested: 1) male-female dyads will be stable throughout the year, 2) male-female dyads will be more prevalent during the mating season, and/or the birth season when infants would be most vulnerable to infanticide, 3) females should copulate either exclusively or most often with their male dyad partner than with other males during the mating and/or birth season, and 4) rates of aggression will be higher between males or between females and males who are not their dyad partner. Predictions 1, 2, and 3 were not supported and Prediction 4 was only partially supported. Adult male-female dyads however, were more prominent in feeding contexts during the mating season and food scarcity periods. Most aggression occurred during feeding between males and nondyad group members. Since female feeding rates were often higher when feeding near male dyad partners, adult male-female dyads may serve as a way of increasing foraging efficiency for the female, which in turn may influence reproductive success. All males who were dyad partners also copulated first and more frequently with all females. It is suggested that "dyad" is a better descriptive term than pair-bonding for the social patterns observed since dyads were comprised of same-sex individuals, were temporary, and did not exclusively serve a reproductive function.
据报道，在鼬狐猴属和大狐猴属的成年雄性和雌性原猴灵长类动物之间存在牢固的社会关系，这种关系被称为“配对结合”。有假说认为，雌性通过与成年雄性建立这种亲密关系，能获得免受杀婴雄性侵害的保护，这意味着二元组中的雄性成员也是其后代的父亲。我利用在马达加斯加东南部收集的关于两组红褐狐猴的野外数据，对这一假说以及“配对结合”这一术语是否恰当进行了评估。测试了四个预测：1）雌雄二元组全年都将保持稳定；2）雌雄二元组在交配季节和/或婴儿最易遭受杀婴行为的出生季节会更为普遍；3）在交配和/或出生季节，雌性应该要么只与它们的雄性二元组伙伴交配，要么与其他雄性相比，最常与它们的雄性二元组伙伴交配；4）非二元组伙伴的雄性之间或雌性与雄性之间的攻击率会更高。预测1、2和3未得到支持，预测4仅得到部分支持。然而，成年雌雄二元组在交配季节和食物短缺时期的进食情境中更为突出。大多数攻击行为发生在雄性与非二元组群体成员进食期间。由于雌性在靠近雄性二元组伙伴进食时进食率往往更高，成年雌雄二元组可能是雌性提高觅食效率的一种方式，这反过来可能会影响繁殖成功率。所有作为二元组伙伴的雄性也都是首先且更频繁地与所有雌性交配。有人认为，对于所观察到的社会模式，“二元组”是比“配对结合”更好的描述性术语，因为二元组由同性个体组成，是临时的，且并非专门用于生殖功能。
