Life at the top ain't easy.
What's the News: In the hardscrabble world of a baboon troop, being the alpha male has its perks: power, food, ample opportunities to woo the ladies. But all that status brings with it a great deal of stress, a new study
shows, as the alpha male constantly scrambles to stay atop the social pyramid. The life of a second-in-command beta male---somewhat fewer perks but, the researchers found, a whole lot less stress---is starting to sound like the better deal. How the Heck:
The researchers gathered samples of feces from 125 adult male baboons in Amboseli, Kenya, collecting more than 4,500 samples over nine years. They then measured the level of glucocorticoids---hormones that play a major role in the body's stress response---in each sample to determine the baboons' stress levels.
Alpha males' stress levels, the samples showed, were high---as high as those of low-ranking males, ...
