Dr. Frans B. M. de Waal was a Dutch/American biologist and primatologist known for his work on the behavior and social intelligence of primates. His first book, Chimpanzee Politics (1982) compared the schmoozing and scheming of chimpanzees involved in power struggles with that of human politicians. De Waal drew parallels between primate and human behavior, from peacemaking and morality to culture. His scientific work was published in hundreds of technical articles in journals such as Science, Nature, Scientific American, and outlets specialized in animal behavior. His popular books — translated into twenty languages — made him one of the world's most visible primatologists. His latest books include The Age of Empathy (2009), The Bonobo and the Atheist (2013), and Different: Gender Through the Eyes of a Primatologist (2022). Two recent edited volumes are The Primate Mind (2012) and Evolved Morality (2014).
De Waal was C. H. Candler Professor in the Psychology Department of Emory University and Director of the Living Links Center at the Yerkes National Primate Research Center, in Atlanta, Georgia. Since 2013, he was a Distinguished Professor (Universiteitshoogleraar) at Utrecht University. He was elected to the (US) National Academy of Sciences, the American Academy of Arts and Sciences, and the Royal Dutch Academy of Sciences. In 2007, he was selected by Time as one of The Worlds' 100 Most Influential People Today, and in 2011 by Discover as among 47 (all time) Great Minds of Science. Being editor-in-chief of the journal Behaviour, de Waal stepped in the footsteps of Niko Tinbergen, one of the founders of ethology.
His latest research concerned empathy and cooperation, inequity aversion and social cognition in chimpanzees, bonobos, and other species. He and his students pioneered studies on how behavior is culturally transmitted in the primates, whether elephants recognize themselves in mirrors, how primates react to unequal reward divisions, how well primates spontaneously cooperate, and whether bonobo orphans are as emotionally affected by their trauma as human orphans.
De Waal passed away in March 2024.
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