'Brilliant, eye-opening, and absolutely inspiring - and a riveting read.' Cass Sunstein, author of How Change Happens and co-author of Nudge What is the secret to humanity's evolutionary success? Could it be our strength, our intellect... or something much nicer? From the authors of New York Times bestseller The Genius of Dogs comes a powerful new idea about how 'friendliness' is the key factor in the flourishing of our species. Hare and Woods present an elegant new theory called self-domestication, looking at examples of co-operation and empathy and what this can tell us about the evolutionary success of Homo sapiens...

This volume includes twelve novel empirical papers focusing on the behaviour and cognition of both captive and wild bonobos (Pan paniscus). As our species less known closest relative, the bonobo has gone from being little studied to increasingly popular as a species of focus over the past decade. Overall this volume demonstrates how anyone interested in understanding humans or chimpanzees must also know bonobos. Bonobos are not only equal to chimpanzees as our relatives, but they are also unique. The majority of papers in this volume show that whether you are interested in the evolution of culture and tool use, social relationships and sharing or foraging ecology and cognition, bonobos have a major contribution to make. Four papers provide further evidence that the behaviour and psychology of bonobo females is radically different from that observed in chimpanzees. Foraging behaviour and cognition of bonobos is the focus of three papers that each show important ways that bonobos spatial cognition differs remarkably from chimpanzees. Two papers are relevant to solving the puzzle of why bonobos are expert extractive foragers in captivity but have never been seen using tools to obtain food in the wild. The articles presented in this volume are previously published in a Special Issue of Behaviour, Volume 152, Parts 3-4 (March 2015).

The international bestseller that reveals the amazing mind of your favourite friend Is your dog purposefully disobeying you? Probably, and usually behind your back. Should you act like 'top dog' to maintain control? No, you're better off displaying your friendliness - and not just to your dog. Which breed is the cleverest? That's the wrong question to ask. These are just some of the extraordinary insights to be found in The Genius of Dogs - the seminal book on how dogs evolved their unique intelligence by award-winning scientist Dr Brian Hare. He shares more than two decades of startling discoveries about the mysteries of the dog mind and how you can use his groundbreaking work to build a better relationship with your own dog.

The bonobo, along with the chimpanzee, is one of our two closest living relatives. Their relatively narrow geographic range (south of the Congo River in the Democratic Republic of Congo) combined with the history of political instability in the region, has made their scientific study extremely difficult. In contrast, there are dozens of wild and captive sites where research has been conducted for decades with chimpanzees. Because data sets on bonobos have been so hard to obtain and so few large-scale studies have been published, the majority of researchers have treated chimpanzee data as being representative of both species. However, this misconception is now rapidly changing. With relative stability in the DRC for over a decade and a growing community of bonobos living in zoos and sanctuaries internationally, there has been an explosion of scientific interest in the bonobo with dozens of high impact publications focusing on this fascinating species. This research has revealed exactly how unique bonobos are in their brains and behavior, and reminds us why it is so important that we redouble our efforts to protect the few remaining wild populations of this iconic and highly endangered great ape species.

The bonobo, along with the chimpanzee, is one of our two closest living relatives. Their relatively narrow geographic range (south of the Congo River in the Democratic Republic of Congo) combined with the history of political instability in the region, has made their scientific study extremely difficult. In contrast, there are dozens of wild and captive sites where research has been conducted for decades with chimpanzees. Because data sets on bonobos have been so hard to obtain and so few large-scale studies have been published, the majority of researchers have treated chimpanzee data as being representative of both species. However, this misconception is now rapidly changing. With relative stability in the DRC for over a decade and a growing community of bonobos living in zoos and sanctuaries internationally, there has been an explosion of scientific interest in the bonobo with dozens of high impact publications focusing on this fascinating species. This research has revealed exactly how unique bonobos are in their brains and behavior, and reminds us why it is so important that we redouble our efforts to protect the few remaining wild populations of this iconic and highly endangered great ape species.