Quantifying direct and indirect maternal effects on male vervets rank post-dispersal

Maternal characteristics show very limited long-term effects on male Chlorocebus pygerythrus rank after dispersal, while males’ post-dispersal grooming out-degree is linked to rank in new groups.

• Why it matters: Maternal behaviour can shape adult fitness, but how it affects male dominance after dispersal—and whether male social behaviour mediates this link—has been largely untested in cercopithecines.
• What they did: Using 16 years of data from a wild Chlorocebus pygerythrus population, the study tested maternal rank, grooming, and proximity against males’ first-year post-dispersal rank, and assessed mediation with Bayesian social networks plus mediation analyses.
• The result: No support emerged for mediation by males’ social behaviour; instead, maternal traits influenced juvenile social behaviour, and males’ post-dispersal grooming out-degree related to rank, with pre-to-post consistency restricted to grooming.

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