Vervet monkey development in a life historical perspective

Abstract

Juvenile primates have rarely been the focus of primate life history research. I followed two cohorts of vervet monkeys from birth to the end of the juvenile period. This presented us with data to study the physical and behavioural development during early life, including an assessment of inter-individual variation in both social behaviour and growth rates. Overall, my data show that—as both theory predicts and other empirical studies have demonstrated- that juveniles develop in a social and ecological context that is dynamic and not fixed. Early life experiences may therefore influence the degree to which adult vervets are able to cope with variation in their social and ecological environments, and may also help explain the inter-individual variation we see within and across populations.