When they grow too big to safely work with humans, they may be sent to a zoo or sanctuary, or abandoned in a so-called roadside zoo. According to the Association of Zoos and Aquariums and the Jane Goodall Institute chimpanzees used in the entertainment industry may be physical beaten, restrained, and may even have teeth removed to prevent them from biting their handlers. However, it does occur in the entertainment industry. Although we don’t know the circumstances of these particular chimpanzees, “entertainment” chimpanzees are often taken from their mothers shortly after birth, and while they may spend some time among other chimps, the majority of their time is spent with human trainers (in the wild, chimpanzees would stay with their mothers for six years or more, until adolescence).Īgain, it must be stressed that there is no evidence of maltreatment of the chimps featured in the iPad magic video. The chimpanzees featured in the iPad magic video are all young juveniles, judging by their size and their pink faces (which darken with age). Adult chimpanzees are incredibly strong, making it typically too dangerous for humans to have direct contact with them. A chimpanzee raised with its primary social contact coming from human trainers, trained to perform “entertaining” behaviours experiences a lifestyle which is far from the naturalistic physical and social environment many experts believe is necessary for their welfare.Īs a general rule, only young chimpanzees can be trained like this. While the negative welfare implications to the chimpanzees in such videos may not be obvious at first glance, there is research showing that the training chimpanzees receive in order to make them viable as “entertainment” has a devastating and lifelong impact on their wellbeing. Unfortunately, not all captive chimpanzees are this lucky.Ĭhimpanzees are still widely used in the entertainment industry and the use of great apes as entertainment is sadly encouraged by videos such as Chimps Amazed by iPad Magic. Being part of a social group of other chimps is therefore critical to their welfare in captivity. This can be done both in terms of enclosures (in the wild chimpanzees would range over dozens of kilometres of rainforest), and by providing stimulating enrichment that might, for example, recreate a foraging situation chimps would face in the wild.Īs we might expect from animals we believe learn many of their behaviours from one another, chimpanzees also live very complex social lives, with wild communities sometimes including hundreds of individuals, who form lifelong friendships and alliances even with individuals they are not closely related to. By studying captive chimpanzees, I hope to find out more about how these traditions emerge and spread through groups of chimpanzees – simply put, how and why do chimpanzees learn from other chimpanzees?įor my research to bear any relevance to wild chimpanzees, the chimps I work with in captivity need to be kept in a way that mimics their wild environment as closely as possible – and indeed, I know many zoo and sanctuary keepers who pride themselves on maximising the welfare of their chimps by providing as natural an environment for them as they can. Research has shown that communities of wild chimpanzees have their own unique sets of commonly used behaviours (like nut-cracking or termite-fishing) that we call chimpanzee culture. Unfortunately, many people who view viral videos featuring primates are simply not aware of these issues.Īs a comparative psychologist (a psychologist who studies the behaviour and cognition of non-human animals), I frequently work with chimpanzees in zoos and sanctuaries. Maybe it made you laugh? Maybe you thought the chimpanzees appearing in it were cute? For primatologists, however, it probably brought to mind issues of welfare in captive apes, particularly those used in entertainment, the difficulty of funding conservation projects in the wild, and the unfortunate growth of a cruel primate pet-trade which undermines conservation efforts. Last week, a video featuring chimpanzees watching iPad magic tricks was shared across the internet, including by this newspaper – perhaps you’ve seen it.
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