Stressed out Baboons!
I love the discovery channel. We can learn so much about human interaction by studying animal behavior. Take lions for example, male lions urinate all over the savanna to mark their territory so other males wouldn't intrude into his controlling land. I'm sure I've seen people do that ... well, not urinate all over the place, but you know what I mean.
So I was reading this article this morning about scientists pinpointing specific events that stress out baboons. I would like to post some excerpts from the article here so we can all learn from our furry friends.
"In one case, an adult female, her adult daughter and a sister all attempted to usurp the power of another unit. After a week of fighting and high stress, the lower-ranked group gave up. In the second period of observed instability, an adult female named Cat ran off with a high-ranked male for several days. When she returned, a "Cat-fight" ensued with the other females. The fights not only lowered the status of Cat, but also placed the unfortunate baboonÂs daughter, sisters, aunt and their children to the bottom of the hierarchy."
I'm sure I've seen that before too .... hmmm.
"Engh says she believes baboons in their natural habitat actually cope with stress better than humans do. "Humans, in contrast (to baboons), get stressed out about many things, often things that are of little significance in our lives or are completely abstract threats," she said. "We would probably be better off aping baboons and worrying only about the important things in our lives."
How true, how true ...