Project Details
Projekt
Effects of progressing age on energy balance, sociality and health in wild female Assamese macaques (Macaca assamensis)
Applicant
Professorin Dr. Julia Ostner
Subject Area
Sensory and Behavioural Biology
Term
from 2014 to 2023
Project identifier
Deutsche Forschungsgemeinschaft (DFG) - Project number 244372499
As humans age they decrease their social activity and become increasingly selective in their choice of partners favoring valuable relationships over less meaningful ones. This socio-emotional selectivity has been attributed to the limited time perspective of elderly humans. A decline in social activity and number of social partners are also characteristics of increasing age in nonhuman primates in the absence of awareness of limited time. We propose that the declining social activity with progressing age is driven by energetic constraints due to age-related decreases in foraging performance, energy intake and energy balance. Energetic constraints and decreasing sociality pose energetic and social stressors and are expected to influence physiological stress levels which in turn impact an individual´s health. In this project on our long-term study population of wild Assamese macaques facing pronounced natural variation in energy availability, we combine data on age effects on food intake and energy budget, measures of social integration, physiological measures of nutritional and social stress with indicators of health, specifically the gut microbial community and a non-specific immune marker. This project has three main goals. First, we will add to the few studies on behavioral gerontology in wild populations under natural ecological conditions which enables us to integrate energetic constraints as an important but rarely investigated factor limiting social activity. Second, we aim to separate physiological responses to nutritional and social stressors experienced by aged individuals by simultaneously measuring a non-specific stress marker (glucocorticoids) and a nutritional stress marker (thyroid hormone). Lastly, we aim to link age-related energetic constraints, physiological stress responses and measures of social integration to health indicators. Together, these data will contribute to a comprehensive understanding of the role of energetic factors on social activity and selectivity with increasing age and will inform studies on human behavioral gerontology.
DFG Programme
Research Units
Subproject of
FOR 2136:
Sociality and Health in Primates
