US EditionChimpanzees consume 'two alcoholic drinks a day', study says
Researchers found wild chimpanzees consume about 14 grams of alcohol daily from fermented fruit, supporting the evolutionary 'drunken monkey hypothesis.'
- Last week, researchers reported that wild chimpanzees consume more than two American standard drinks per day from fruit, in a study led by biologist Aleksey Maro of the University of California, Berkeley.
- Researchers measured ethanol across 21 fruit species at two sites, Ngogo, Uganda and Taï National Park, Ivory Coast, calculating chimps ingest roughly 14 grams daily from up to 4kg of fruit.
- Samples from Uganda registered 0.32 and Ivory Coast samples 0.31, with fermented fruit samples averaging 0.26% ethanol by weight, according to lab analyses.
- The authors argue the findings point to evolutionary links, as they say alcohol is a natural part of chimpanzee diets and researchers propose it may boost chimp sociality.
- These studies represent a shift from anecdote to quantitative measurement, including 2015 raffia palm sap observations and Guinea-Bissau, April 2025 breadfruit recordings, prompting further research.
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157 Articles
Africa: Chimpanzees Ingest More Than the Equivalent of One Alcoholic Drink a Day - New Research
Analysis - Drinking more than you intended may be something that many humans do, but now research is showing that a taste for alcohol is surprisingly common among animals. In fact a new study has found that chimpanzees may ingest the equivalent of two alcoholic drinks a day from eating fermented fruit.
They apparently don’t know but, through the fermented fruit they eat, chimpanzees drink alcohol. They drink the equivalent of about two standard alcoholic drinks daily, according to a study published in Science Advances magazine. The research, carried out by an international team of scientists coordinated by the University of California at Berkeley, United States, has been conducted with wild chimpanzees in Uganda and Ivory Coast. The study has …
Chimpanzees take up alcohol daily through ripe fruits – about as much as in a small beer. Researchers suspect that this can also derive insights into the drinking habits of humans.
According to a study published in the journal Science Advances, using ripe fruit, chimpanzees consume the equivalent of several glasses of alcohol per day.
The researchers looked at the alcohol content of fruits eaten by chimpanzees.
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