The surprising science of alpha males

Well, I have known many
alpha males in my life,

chimpanzee alpha males,

and I'm going to talk about
what an alpha male is,

because I think we can all learn
a lot from our close relatives

where we have alpha males.

And as an example, I want to give you
Amos, a male that I knew

who was a young male
and he was alpha male,

he was very popular,

but he got sick

and he lost his position because,
you know, chimpanzee males

they can spot from a mile away
if you are weak

and they went for him,

and he lost his position,
and then he got sicker and sicker

until at some point

we had to isolate him.

The group lived on a grassy island,

and we had to isolate him in a cage,

but we cracked open the cage
so that the rest of the chimps

still had access to him.

And what happened was most touching.

Other chimps would bring food to him,

they would bring wood wool to him,

which is this thing that they use
to sleep in and build nests out of,

and females would put
the wood wool behind his back.

He was leaning heavily against the wall,

and look, the way we do with pillows
and to patients in a hospital,

they were putting
that stuff behind his back.

And I thought, this is the way
to go for an alpha male.

He was loved and respected,
and everyone was taking care of him,

and this is not always how it goes,

because some males don't answer well
when they lose their position.

So Amos was an example
of a male who was liked as a leader,

and I think the term alpha male,

if you look it up on the internet,

you will find all these business books
that tell you how to be an alpha male,

and what they mean
is how to beat up others

and beat them over the head
and let them know that you are boss

and don't mess with me and so on.

And basically an alpha male
for them is a bully.

And I really don't like
that kind of description,

because I am actually partly responsible
for the term "alpha male"

because I wrote this book
"Chimpanzee Politics,"

which was recommended by Newt Gingrich

to freshmen congressmen.

I don't know what good it did,
but he recommended that book to them,

and after that the term
"alpha male" became very popular.

But I think it is used
in a mischaracterization.

It's used in a very superficial way

that doesn't relate to what
a real alpha male is.

And so I'm here to explain what that is.

The term itself goes back
Actually much further.

It goes back to the '40s and '50s,
research on wolves,

and basically the definition
is very simple.

The highest ranking male
is the alpha male.

The highest ranking female
is the alpha female.

Every primate group
has one alpha male, one alpha female,

not more than that, there's only one.

And I will explain how that goes.

So first, the body language.

What you see here is two male chimpanzees

who are the same size,

but one is walking upright,
has his hair up,

has a big rock in his hand,
and he's the alpha male.

The other male is ?? to him,

is being submissive to him
and bowing for him,

and that is the sort of ritual they need
to go through many times a day

in order to have a stable relationship.

I'll show you a video from the field.

What you will see here is a female
?? to an alpha male

and you will see how that goes.

The male is approaching,

she grunts at him,

he has all his hair up,

and he displays.

I'm actually standing far too close.

A chimpanzee is far stronger than I am,

and I just was not very prudent
this particular video.

So what you saw him do

is he was lifting himself up
and standing on two legs

and putting his arms out.

That's called the bipedal swagger.

It's a very common posture
in high-ranking males,

and it's very recognizable
because humans do this kind of stuff.

(Laughter)

Humans do this all the time.

And what I really like
about this particular picture

is the two old guys to the side.

This is very chimpanzee.

In chimpanzees,

we have usually old males
who are over the hill

who cannot be alpha male
themselves anymore,

but they start playing games
and forming coalitions

and behind the backs of others,

and they become extremely influential,
and you may actually have old males

who are more influential
than the alpha male himself.

Just as an example,

the three males that I
used to work with most

at the Dutch Zoo long ago,
there where I worked,

and the middle male here
is a 17-year old alpha male.

The male who is grooming
on the side is twice as old

and this old male has made him the leader.

So you can imagine that that old male
has an enormous amount of power,

because he has made
the alpha male alpha male.

The male on the right

is individually the strongest male.

In captivity, you can test it out,

and you can know that this male
has no trouble with either one.

He has only trouble
with the combination of the two.

And so the coalition formation
that goes on in chimpanzee society

makes it much more complex than you think.

It means, for example,

that the smallest male in a group
can be the alpha male.

You don't need to be
the biggest and strongest male.

The smallest male, if he has
the right friends and keeps them happy,

or he has female support,

he can be the alpha male.

So the coalition system
makes everything complex,

and I'm always waiting here in the US

for the primaries,
the end of the primaries,

because that's a moment
where you need to demonstrate unity.

Now let me first show you
how the unity is shown in chimpanzees.

What you see here is two males on the left

who are standing together.

You also see the big
canine teeth that they have.

And they're standing together and they
demonstrate to the rest of the group,

"We are together.

We are a unit."

The males on the right
are walking together in synchrony.