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Family first! Influence of parental investment in Guinea pigs (Cavia porcellus) prosocial choices

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Abstract

Literature often assumed that prosocial behaviours (behaviours that benefit others with or without a cost for the actor) would have evolved many species to improve the effectiveness of parental care (Decety and Cowell 2014). While this hypothesis is rarely questioned at a phylogenetic scale, it was never tested at an individual scale to the best of our knowledge. Therefore, we chose to study the impact of effective parental care on prosociality by comparing the prosocial tendencies of Guinea pigs before mating, during mating and after parturition. We conducted Prosocial Choice Tests on three groups of Guinea pigs (males, multiparous females, and nulliparous females). Subjects had to choose between three options: a prosocial option (subject and recipient being rewarded), a selfish option (only subject was rewarded), and a null option (no reward). Our results showed high prosociality towards their mating partner and their young both in male and in female subjects. Males became selfish towards other males after parturition. Among other interesting results, we found a direct reciprocity phenomenon. We also highlighted an ability in our subjects to consider both the identity and relationship shared with the recipient, such as tolerance (enhancing prosociality), dominance rank (being tested with a dominant recipient increasing selfish responses), and its behaviour (begging calls eliciting prosociality, while threatening ones decreasing it), to choose an option. These findings suggested that prosociality could be modulated by many factors and that the constraints and stakes induced by breeding would highly influence prosocial strategies.

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Acknowledgements

The authors would particularly like to thank the students who participated in this experiment for their involvement and their enthusiasm: Solenn Penfrat, Séverine Caré, Solène Sagne, Camille Bloch, Chéïma Barhoumi, Willem Bonnaffe, and Anne-Sophie Ferret. As well, we would like to thank all the keepers for their time, for their flexibility and for the care provided to the Guinea pigs.

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  1. Laboratoire Ethologie Cognition Développement, UPL, Université Paris Nanterre, 92000, Nanterre, France

    Mathilde Lalot & Dalila Bovet

  2. Ménagerie du Jardin des Plantes, Muséum National d’Histoire Naturelle, Paris, France

    Aude Bourgeois & Michel Saint Jalme

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  1. Mathilde Lalot
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Lalot, M., Bourgeois, A., Jalme, M.S. et al. Family first! Influence of parental investment in Guinea pigs (Cavia porcellus) prosocial choices. Anim Cogn 26, 1713–1732 (2023). https://doi.org/10.1007/s10071-023-01813-x

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