Expert Angle: Punch the Monkey and Primate Behavior

If you’ve been online in the last few weeks, you’ve seen Punch the Monkey — a baby Japanese macaque at the Ichikawa City Zoo who skyrocketed to viral fame after being rejected by his mother. He has won the hearts of people around the globe by clinging to his IKEA orangutan toy while dealing with bullying from other monkeys in his enclosure. 

SJU News chatted with Alexander J. Skolnick, PhD, a professor of psychology and the director of the animal studies program, to learn about primate behavior and why Punch won’t be relocated any time soon. 

Why are some of the adult monkeys attacking Punch?

Japanese macaques live in groups in which dominance ranks are very important in most things that they do, so there are some high-, middle-, and bottom-ranking females and males. Their dominance rank often determines who they interact with, who grooms them (a very social activity) or whom they might groom. They also get pushed around a lot, and sometimes when a low- or mid-ranking female is threatened by somebody ranked more highly, the one thing they can do to prevent getting attacked is to attack somebody lower ranking than themselves. 

I do not know anything about the specific relationships in this zoo-living group, but the pattern where a female adult runs over to mess with Punch fits with this typical pattern of group interactions. Without a mother or family group, Punch is really at the bottom of the hierarchy, so anytime a low-ranking female (or male) is threatened by a higher ranking animal, Punch is in a perfect position to be the victim of a lot of that redirected aggression.

Could the zoo remove Punch from the group? 

Removing him would actually be really hard on Punch because macaques are very social animals — being without an adult or other group members would not be psychologically healthy for him. We know from a lot of research in zoos, research centers and in the wild that social primates might become depressed by being separated from the rest of the group.

Can you explain Punch’s connection to his orangutan toy? 

In the 1950s and 60s, psychologist Harry Harlow did a famous series of experiments to see whether baby monkeys would choose a mother figure made of wire with a food source or one covered in soft cloth. It turned out that the monkeys would go to the wire mom to feed and then immediately go back to the cloth mom — that soft touch was important to them. From that, he learned that the monkeys were using the cloth mom as a secure base, just like we talk about with human babies and attachment to mom. 

That’s what the orangutan is for Punch; it’s like a security blanket. In theory, as he gets older and when he starts playing with others, he won’t need it as much.