<?xml version="1.0" encoding="UTF-8"?><xml><records><record><source-app name="Biblio" version="7.x">Drupal-Biblio</source-app><ref-type>17</ref-type><contributors><authors><author><style face="normal" font="default" size="100%">Brooker, Jake S.</style></author><author><style face="normal" font="default" size="100%">Goldsborough, Zoë</style></author><author><style face="normal" font="default" size="100%">van Leeuwen, Edwin J. C.</style></author><author><style face="normal" font="default" size="100%">Kordon, Stephanie</style></author><author><style face="normal" font="default" size="100%">Webb, Christine E.</style></author><author><style face="normal" font="default" size="100%">Clay, Zanna</style></author></authors></contributors><titles><title><style face="normal" font="default" size="100%">Reassuring body contact promotes social tolerance in bonobos and chimpanzees</style></title><secondary-title><style face="normal" font="default" size="100%">Proceedings of the Royal Society B: Biological Sciences</style></secondary-title></titles><dates><year><style  face="normal" font="default" size="100%">2026</style></year><pub-dates><date><style  face="normal" font="default" size="100%">2026/07/01</style></date></pub-dates></dates><urls><web-urls><url><style face="normal" font="default" size="100%">https://royalsocietypublishing.org/rspb/article/293/2075/20253190/482572/Reassuring-body-contact-promotes-social-tolerance</style></url></web-urls></urls><volume><style face="normal" font="default" size="100%">293</style></volume><isbn><style face="normal" font="default" size="100%">1471-2954</style></isbn><language><style face="normal" font="default" size="100%">eng</style></language><abstract><style face="normal" font="default" size="100%">&lt;p&gt;&lt;meta charset=&quot;UTF-8&quot; /&gt;Social tolerance underpins cooperation in humans and other social animals, but its proximate drivers in short-term, competitive contexts remain poorly understood. Reassurance behaviours may enable individuals to pre-empt conflict and signal benign intent, facilitating social tolerance. We tested whether reassuring body contact during anticipation of a collective feeding event promotes cofeeding tolerance in our closest primate relatives. Using a controlled cofeeding paradigm across five semi-wild bonobo and chimpanzee groups (&lt;em&gt;n&lt;/em&gt;&amp;nbsp;= 116 individuals), we quantified pre-feeding affiliative contact and measured access to a restricted, depleting food zone. In both species, increased affiliative body contact enhanced subsequent cofeeding tolerance in most groups. Bonobo female&amp;ndash;female pairs and chimpanzee male&amp;ndash;male pairs engaged in more pre-feeding reassurance than other-sex pairings, aligning with species-specific predictions. However, these trends were only clear for socially tolerant groups. Likewise, vulnerable chimpanzee-specific kissing behaviours were more prevalent in a tolerant group. Our results reveal that reassuring contact may function as a flexible, short-term mechanism to mitigate contest competition and promote group-level tolerance. By identifying a proximate behavioural tool for managing competition in our closest cousins, our findings demonstrate the important role that friendly social behaviours play in negotiating the trade-off between competition and cooperation, as is essential to our own species&amp;rsquo; survival.&lt;/p&gt;
</style></abstract><issue><style face="normal" font="default" size="100%">2075</style></issue></record></records></xml>