With a little help from my friends
Scientists have discovered that support from family and friends significantly reduces stress in wild chimpanzees during conflicts with rival groups.
In humans and other social animals stress is associated with poor health and high mortality. These negative effects can be buffered by receiving social support from relatives or friends. However, the mechanisms responsible for this effect remain largely unknown.
Research conducted by scientists at the University of St Andrews and the Max Planck Institute for Evolutionary Anthropology in Leipzig studied how wild chimpanzees cope with stressful and non-stressful situations when a close bond partner is present or absent.
They measured the animals’ urinary stress hormone levels during episodes of intergroup conflict and during periods of grooming and resting and found that the support of a friend significantly reduced the chimpanzees’ stress hormone levels, especially in situations of conflict.
But even during affiliative activities with the bond partner stress levels were generally lower. The scientists concluded that daily supportive actions by friends and family may be key to regulating stress hormone activity, and thus the negative effects of stress, a finding with potential medical implications for humans.
https://www.st-andrews.ac.uk/news/archive/2016/title,863898,en.php