Much evidence has now accumulated in support of this theory, originally put forth by Sigmund Freud in 1940. This served as the foundation upon which Harry Harlow based his experiments in 1962 on the early rearing environments of rhesus monkeys (Macaca mulatta). He found somewhat contradictory results that indicated a fairly dispensable infant-mother affectional system, but an essential infant-infant system for the proper development of all aspects of a monkey's normal behavioral repertoire (1).
[...] This maternal ‘rejection' is initiated by the infant's behavior and physical changes; as the infant plays more vigorously it becomes more of a nuisance to its mother. Once weaned, the mother-infant conflict continues as they may occasionally be competing for food It should be noted that males tend to become independent of the mother at an earlier age than do females Hansen designed an experiment where he raised rhesus monkeys in two different environments; one group with their mothers, the other with surrogate mothers. [...]
[...] Infants were observed to groom other infants more frequently than they groomed their mothers Harry Harlow states that is apparent also that sexual activity is stimulated by the mother's grooming of the infant” and that the mother begins occasionally to reject its offspring in the third and fourth month, the infant is propelled into closer relationships with its peers.” This knowledge could present some practical problems, because if an individually housed rhesus monkey lacks the grooming stimulation from its mother in order to attain sexual maturity at the appropriate developmental stage, then this will affect captive breeding programs. [...]
[...] When he raised infant rhesus monkeys without their mothers but allowed them 20 minutes a day in the playroom to socialize with each other, they developed into normal adults displaying the full growth pattern and play and sexual behaviors expected from rhesus monkeys. Those monkeys, however that he reared only with their mothers and without any other social contact with conspecifics displayed the most dysfunctional behavior when tested together in the playroom; they would not play together and lacked any signs of sexual behaviors Enrichment in Captivity There are many strategies that may be employed in order to reduce the occurrence of stereotypic behaviors in individually-housed monkeys, and thus improve their overall welfare. [...]
[...] The surrogate-raised monkeys, however, retained more physical contact with their ‘mothers' after the first 60 days than those with non-surrogate mothers, presumably because they did not experience the normal maternal rejection phase Development of Grooming Behavior Grooming is a very important social behavior for non-human primates, and since these animals are routinely kept in captivity it is important that we have knowledge of this behavior in order to accommodate it in captive environments. There are two types of grooming, autogrooming and allogrooming. [...]
[...] http://mysite.verizon.net/res6mzx3/gombe3/ papers/ 2002.pdf Hinde R.A., Spencer-Booth Y The behaviour of socially living rhesus monkeys in their first two and a half years. Anim. Behav. 15:169- Hansen, E. W The development of maternal and infant behavior in the rhesus monkey. Behaviour 27:107- Martin L.J., Spicer D.M., Lewis M.H., Gluck J.P., Cork L.C Social Deprivation of Infant Rhesus Monkeys Alters the Chemoarchitecture of the Brain: I. Subcortical Regions. The Journal of Neuroscience 11(11):3344- Siegel S.J., Ginsberg S.D., Hof P.R., Foote S.L., Young W.G., Kraemer G.W., McKinney W.T., Morrison J.H Effects of social deprivation in prepubescent rhesus monkeys: immunohistochemical analysis of the neurofilament protein triplet in the hippocampal formation. [...]
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