Wolves are highly social and intelligent animals that live in close family groups called packs. Given their complex social structures and bonding behaviors, there has been much interest in whether wolves are capable of feeling empathy or sympathy towards each other. In this article, we will examine the evidence around wolf cognition and social emotions to try to answer the question of whether wolves feel sympathy.
What is sympathy?
Before looking at wolf behavior, it’s important to define what we mean by “sympathy”. Sympathy refers to the ability to perceive and respond to the emotional and mental states of others. It involves being able to put yourself in someone else’s “shoes” and experiencing feelings of concern or sorrow for their distress. Closely related to empathy, sympathy goes beyond just understanding someone else’s emotions to actually feeling motivated to provide comfort, aid, or support.
Do wolves have complex social cognition?
For an animal to be capable of sympathy, it must first have some capacity for social cognition and perception. It needs to be able to recognize others within its social group, observe their behaviors and facial/vocal expressions, and interpret what those signs mean about how they are feeling. Do wolves have this level of social intelligence and awareness?
Studies suggest that they do. Wolves live in sophisticated social packs made up of a breeding male and female, their offspring from previous years, and sometimes unrelated adult wolves. These packs cooperate in hunting, pup-rearing, and territorial defense. Wolves maintain these social bonds through behaviors like gentle play, grooming, and regurgitating food for each other.
Research also indicates that wolves are capable of cross-modal perception, meaning they can recognize other wolves by integrating signals from sight, sound, and scent. They seem able to discern emotional states like aggression or anxiety based on posture, facial expression, and chemical cues. Wolves regularly console anxious or greeting pack members by licking faces and providing close contact. Overall, scientists believe wolves have demonstrated the social cognition needed as a foundation for complex emotions like sympathy.
How do wolves care for injured or sick pack members?
One source of evidence related to wolf sympathy comes from how they treat pack members who become injured or ill. In multiple observations, wolves have been seen to provide additional caretaking behaviors towards ailing comrades, suggesting concern for their suffering.
For example, biologist Douglas Smith described witnessing an elderly female wolf in Yellowstone National Park who had lost her ability to keep up with her pack. The other wolves would wait for her to catch up, bring her food, and defend her from scavengers trying to steal her kills. They continued caring for her until she passed away.
Other researchers have noted cases where male wolves have brought meat back to dens for lactating mothers staying with pups. Nursing female wolves are the only adults who don’t leave dens to hunt, so this behavior shows thoughtfulness from the males towards their hungry partners.
These caretaking actions indicate wolves are responsive to the condition and vulnerability of other individuals, trying to alleviate their hardship. This suggests a form of sympathetic concern.
How do wolves mourn the loss of pack members?
In addition to caring for living members, wolves also demonstrate behaviors in response to death that could reflect sympathy and mourning. When a pack member dies, the rest of the pack often remains close by the deceased wolf for an extended time. They may guard the body and prevent scavengers from approaching.
Biologists have observed wolves holding vigils, sitting in silence near the body of a dead pack mate for hours. Often they howl, which researchers speculate is a distress response. Some wolves have been seen to lick or nuzzle the deceased wolf. The pack may lay over the grave site even after burial.
This type of grieving behavior suggests wolves have at least a basic awareness of death and loss. Staying near a deceased pack mate and expressing agitation indicates they feel some form of sympathy for the missing member.
How do wolf pups behave towards each other?
Looking at the interactions between young wolves can also provide insight into natural sympathy behaviors within packs. Wolf pups begin play-fighting with their litter-mates at around 3 weeks old. During these tussles, scientists have observed that pups will often inhibit the force of their bites.
If one pup reacts with a yelp of pain, the biter is likely to stop immediately, lick the distressed pup’s face, and initiate gentle play. This impulse to make amends shows concern for the playmate’s distress. As adults, wolves demonstrate similar affectionate behaviors when greeting or consoling each other.
Pups also sometimes go through bouts of separation anxiety if isolated from the pack. Littermates seem to empathize with the distress calls of a separated sibling, joining in the crying. This suggests an early form of sympathetic recognition of and response to another’s fear or loneliness.
Do wolves demonstrate targeted helping behaviors?
Some of the strongest potential evidence of complex sympathy in wolves comes from cases where one wolf appears to intentionally help or aid another in a targeted way. Scientists define this “targeted helping” as a behavior that benefits another individual specifically in response to their current need or goal.
For example, biologist Jean-Marc Landry observed a scene in a wild wolf pack where an elder wolf struggled and whined as it tried to walk on snow with injured paws. A younger female repeatedly attempted to assist it – excavating solid footing, using her body to support the elder, and slowing her pace to stay beside it. This seemed an effortful response tailored to ease the elder’s difficulty.
Other cases of helping include wolves digging to enlarge narrow den entrances when pups struggle to enter, bringing food to sick pack members, or guarding injured comrades from threats. The selectivity of these aid behaviors suggests wolves can intuit and respond compassionately to what others specifically need.
What does brain research say about wolf sympathy?
Scientists have also examined wolf brains for structures and functionality related to social bonding, empathy, and sympathy. Wolves have neural pathways connecting emotional processing areas of the brain with those controlling facial expressions and voice modulation.
This neurology supports their ability to register the emotional states of others through observing behavioral cues. MRI scans also reveal that dog and wolf brains contain spindle neurons, a specialized cell associated with complex social cognition in humans, apes, and elephants.
Research on dog-human relationships suggests domesticated canines developed higher empathy skills than wolves. However, wolves still appear to have the core neural capacity for recognizing and responding to distress or neediness in their pack members.
Are wolves unique in displaying sympathy?
While the complex pack dynamics of wolves makes them a compelling example, they are not the only animal to demonstrate apparent sympathetic behaviors. Empathy and concern for others in distress has also been observed in other highly social mammals including elephants, primates, and cetaceans like dolphins.
What sets wolves apart is how integral sympathy seems to be in their group cooperative strategy and strong family bonds. Packs that can effectively perceive and care for vulnerable members likely gain an adaptive advantage. So sympathy may be essential for wolf social structures to function.
Conclusion
In summary, while we can’t definitively prove the subjective emotional experience of wolves, the preponderance of evidence suggests wolf behavior meets many criteria for sympathy:
- Complex social cognition and perception skills
- Targeted helping behaviors towards injured, sick, or struggling packmates
- Distress vocalizations and proximity maintenance towards dying members
- Affectionate comforting of pups or adults in distress
- Neural pathways supporting empathy and bonding
Through field research and observation, biologists have documented multiple examples of wolves voluntarily providing care, aid, patience, and comfort to other wolves facing hardship or distress. Combined with their intelligence and social bonds, such evidence points to wolves as likely being capable of a sympathetic consciousness and concern for their fellow pack members.