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Outbyte Driver Updater FREEFix the driver behind crashes, sound loss and screen glitchesFind Drivers →Outbyte PC Repair FREERepair Windows errors before they cause bigger problemsFix Now →In a controlled task, chimpanzees took pineapple less often from individuals classified as friends than from non-friends: theft occurred in 61% of friend-condition trials and 70% of non-friend-condition trials. The 2026 result suggests that social relationships influenced behavior in this group of sanctuary chimpanzees; it does not establish a universal rule about chimpanzees or prove they follow a human-like moral code.
What the study tested
The study, “Chimpanzees steal less from their friends and expect them to do the same,” by Oded Ritov and colleagues, examined whether relationship strength affected chimpanzees’ willingness to take food from a partner—and how they reacted when a partner took food from them. It was published online on September 1, 2026, in Evolution and Human Behavior. Read the scholarly article record.
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The researchers studied 26 chimpanzees at Ngamba Island Chimpanzee Sanctuary in Uganda. They used 800 hours of observations of naturally occurring interactions—including grooming, co-feeding, touch, and proximity—to characterize stronger and weaker social relationships. “Friend” and “non-friend” were operational categories based on those observed relationships, not a claim that chimpanzee bonds are identical to human friendships.
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In the experimental task, one chimpanzee had started eating while another could pull a rope to take away the victim’s tray of pineapple. Each victim experienced both friend and non-friend conditions. The researchers matched friend and non-friend pairs on sex and dominance rank, helping to separate relationship strength from those characteristics.
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What happened when a chimpanzee could take a friend’s food?
Thieves took the pineapple in 61% of friend-condition trials, compared with 70% of non-friend-condition trials. These percentages describe trials in this experiment; they are not estimates of how often chimpanzees steal in general, in the wild, or even across all sanctuary settings.
The difference indicates that relationship condition mattered in the task. It does not mean chimpanzees never took food from friends: theft still occurred in a majority of friend-condition trials.
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How did victims and thieves react?
Observed negative emotion differed by relationship and role. Victims initially showed more negative emotion when a friend took their food, then moderated their responses over additional trials. Thieves showed more negative emotion in the non-friend condition, a pattern the researchers interpreted as consistent with experiencing those interactions as more hostile.
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1Clear out junk files and repair common Windows errors2Scan for outdated or missing drivers - takes under a minute3Repair Windows errors before they cause bigger problemsThe study therefore found more than a difference in whether the rope was pulled. Emotional behavior also varied with the relationship condition, and the pattern was not identical for victims and thieves.
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What the findings do—and do not—say about friendship
The results support the conclusion that social relationships influenced behavior in this particular task. They are consistent with the idea that chimpanzees adjust antisocial behavior around close social partners and may have relationship-related expectations. The experiment does not, on its own, show that chimpanzees consciously represent friendship, fairness, or a human-like moral rule. Those are possible interpretations of the findings, not mental processes established by the task.
A University of California, Berkeley-attributed release, republished by Phys.org, quoted first author Oded Ritov as saying, “Ours is the first study to show that they’re able to hold back antisocial behavior with their friends.” Senior author Jan Engelmann said, “We expect more of our friends.” Engelmann also described the work as, “to my knowledge, the first evidence showing that chimpanzees also expect and maybe demand special treatment from their friends,” and said such expectations “might form the basis of human moral principles.” These are researchers’ interpretations in the release, not proof that chimpanzee and human moral thinking are the same. Read the Berkeley-attributed summary republished by Phys.org.
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