Cooperation and culture are central to the success of humans and other social animals, yet the ecological and social conditions that allow them to emerge, persist and spread are not well understood. The newly established Max Planck Research Group “Cooperative Cultures”, led by behavioural ecologist Dr. Liran Samuni, will investigate how environmental variability, and threats from outsider conspecifics influence cooperation and cultural traditions among our closest living relatives: chimpanzees and bonobos. The group started its work in June 2026.
Uncovering the roots of cooperation and culture
Throughout the animal kingdom, individuals must adapt to changing environments, competition and social challenges. In highly social species, cooperation can help individuals access food, form alliances, raise offspring and defend territories. At the same time, learned behaviours can be passed between individuals and across generations, resulting in cultural traditions that vary between groups and populations. Understanding when and why such behaviours are maintained or lost, and the benefits they afford, is crucial for reconstructing the evolutionary origins of human social life.
How cooperation and culture take shape
The Cooperative Cultures research group will address fundamental questions about the ecological and social basis of cooperation and culture in hominids and beyond. The group will examine the influence of environmental variability, out-group threat and tolerance towards outsiders on cooperative tendencies and the persistence and transmission of cultural behaviours across populations and groups of bonobos (Pan paniscus) and chimpanzees (Pan troglodytes).
“Chimpanzees and bonobos provide a valuable perspective on the evolution of cooperation and culture,” says Liran Samuni. “They are our two closest living relatives and share many developmental, social and cognitive traits, yet they differ in important ways. Compared to chimpanzees, bonobos are generally more tolerant of outsiders and even engage in cooperative exchange, including food sharing, across groups. At the same time, bonobos are thought to be less culturally diverse and to display more limited behavioural diversity than their sister species. These natural contrasts allow us to study the conditions under which certain social tendencies or behavioural flexibility emerge and to better understand the evolutionary trajectories of cooperation and culture.”
Comparing our closest living relatives
To address these questions, the group will analyse extensive long-term datasets on the ecology, demography, behaviour, and physiology of chimpanzees and bonobos. By comparing multiple populations of both species over extended periods, the researchers intend to pinpoint the environmental and social factors that encourage cooperation, shape interactions between groups, and facilitate the spread or persistence of cultural traditions.
This multi-species, multi-population approach will shed new light on how animals use social strategies and learnt behaviours to adapt to changing environments. By studying the similarities and differences between chimpanzees and bonobos, the researchers hope to gain a better understanding of the evolutionary pathways that shaped human cooperation and culture.
About Liran Samuni
Liran Samuni received her PhD in Biology from the Max Planck Institute for Evolutionary Anthropology and Leipzig University in 2018. During her doctoral research, she studied chimpanzee cooperative strategies during intergroup competition, hunting and food sharing. After a brief period working as a postdoctoral researcher at the Max Planck Institute for Evolutionary Anthropology in Leipzig, she joined Harvard University as a Postdoctoral Fellow in 2019, and the University of St Andrews as a Newton Research Fellow in 2022. In 2023, she established and began leading the Emmy Noether Research Group “Primate Cooperative Evolution” at the German Primate Center in Göttingen, studying the intersection between cooperation and competition in chimpanzees and bonobos. Samuni has been Co-Director of the Taï Chimpanzee Project (TCP) since 2024, and in 2022 has established the Moyen Bafing Chimpanzee Project in Guinea. She combines long-term field studies, behavioural observations and the collection of ecological and physiological data to understand the evolution of cooperation, social relationships and culture in great apes using comparative approaches.
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Max Planck Research Groups offer early-career researchers with a doctoral degree an excellent opportunity to qualify for a further high-level career. The leaders of these groups are appointed by the President of the Max Planck Society and have independent status within the institute.
Contact:
Dr. Liran Samuni
Max Planck Research Group Cooperative Cultures
Max Planck Institute for Evolutionary Anthropology, Leipzig
liran_samuni@[>>> Please remove the text! <<<]eva.mpg.de
Sandra Jacob
Press Officer
Max Planck Institute for Evolutionary Anthropology, Leipzig
+49 341 3550-122
jacob@[>>> Please remove the text! <<<]eva.mpg.de