Affectional Response in the Infant Monke ' Orphaned baby monkeys develop

Investigators from diverse behavioral fields have long recognized the strong attachment of the neonatal and infantile animal to its mother. Although this affectional behavior has been commonly observed, there is, outside the field of ethology, scant experimental evidence permitting identification of the factors critical to the formation of this bond. Lorenz (1) and others have stressed the importance of innate visual and auditory mechanisms which, through the process of imprinting, give rise to persisting following responses in the infant bird and fish. Imprinting behavior has been demonstrated successfully in a variety. of avian species under controlled laboratory conditions, and this phenomenon has been investigated systematically in order to identify those variables which contribute to its development and maintenance [see, for example, Hinde, Thorpe, and Vince (2), Fabricius (3), Hess (4), Jaynes (5), and Moltz and Rosenblum (6) ]. These studies represent the largest body of existent experimental evidence measuring the tie between infant and mother. At the mammalian level there is little or no systematic experimental evidence of this nature. Observations on monkeys by Carpenter (7), Nolte (8), and Zuckermann (9) and on chimpanzees by Kohler (10) and by Yerkes and Tomilin (11) show