Journal
SCIENCE
Volume 333, Issue 6040, Pages 357-360Publisher
AMER ASSOC ADVANCEMENT SCIENCE
DOI: 10.1126/science.1207120
Keywords
-
Categories
Funding
- NSF [IOB-0322781, BCS-0323596]
- NIH [R03 MH65294]
- National Institute on Aging [P30 AG024361, P01 AG031719, R01-AG034513]
- Direct For Biological Sciences
- Division Of Environmental Biology [0846286] Funding Source: National Science Foundation
Ask authors/readers for more resources
In social hierarchies, dominant individuals experience reproductive and health benefits, but the costs of social dominance remain a topic of debate. Prevailing hypotheses predict that higher-ranking males experience higher testosterone and glucocorticoid (stress hormone) levels than lower-ranking males when hierarchies are unstable but not otherwise. In this long-term study of rank-related stress in a natural population of savannah baboons (Papio cynocephalus), high-ranking males had higher testosterone and lower glucocorticoid levels than other males, regardless of hierarchy stability. The singular exception was for the highest-ranking (alpha) males, who exhibited both high testosterone and high glucocorticoid levels. In particular, alpha males exhibited much higher stress hormone levels than second-ranking (beta) males, suggesting that being at the very top may be more costly than previously thought.
Authors
I am an author on this paper
Click your name to claim this paper and add it to your profile.
Reviews
Recommended
No Data Available