THE EFFECT OF A SHORT-TERM BIOMEDICAL-RESEARCH PROTOCOL ON STEREOTYPED ROCKING IN YOUNG CHIMPANZEES

Chimpanzees are sometimes housed in conditions of restricted social co ntact during use in biomedical research, a practice that may adversely affect their behaviour. This study measured the impact of such condit ions on levels of stereotyped body rocking in six young, nursery-reare d chimpanzees. Subject age at the beginning of the biomedical research protocol ranged from 1.1 to 3.8 years. Over a six-month period the su bjects were moved to a different facility. During this time they were used in a biomedical research study which involved some periods of sin gle housing. They were then returned to their original facility. The p ercentage of time subjects devoted to stereotyped rocking was measured for 36 weeks before and 36 weeks after participation in the biomedica l protocol. Data on body rocking were also analysed for a post-test co ntrol group of animals (n = 9) who had a similar history of hand-reari ng, but who did not leave the facility to participate in a biomedical research study. The behavioural analyses included 263 hours of focal a nimal observational data and revealed that the experimental subjects d evoted equivalent amounts of time to rocking before and after particip ation in the biomedical research protocol. The experimental subjects a nd the control subjects showed similar levels of rocking. These findin gs indicate that participation in this particular short-term biomedica l research protocol did not affect the expression of stereotyped rocki ng in chimpanzees.