It turns out that chimpanzees enjoy a movie night in just as much as us humans, according to a new study from researchers at Duke University in the US.
While it’s widely known that we ‘bond’ with our fellow man through group activities like listening to music or playing board games, whether this cultural effect happens in other species has been unclear.
For the study, chimps were placed in pairs and shown a short video. Afterwards, researchers measured how long it took them to approach their movie-watching buddies – how close they got and how long they remained in proximity.
The chimps who had viewed the video with either another of their own species (or even a human) approached their viewing partner much faster and spent longer in proximity to them, compared with those who had watched the video solo.
Experts say this might mean our social bonds created by shared experiences may have deeper evolutionary roots than we previously thought!
We’re not sure what movie they watched, though. Planet of the Apes?
