Ten researchers collaborated in a long-term study of social conventions in wild white-faced capuchin monkeys, involving examination of a 19,000-hour combined data set collected on 13 social groups at four study sites in Costa Rica over a 13-year period. Five behavior patterns qualified as social traditions, according to the study's criteria: handsniffing, sucking of body parts, and three types of "games." Some conventions were independently invented in virtually identical form at multiple

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... The extinction of several conventions was observed during the course of the study; it appears that they rarely last longer than ten years. It is hypothesized that the monkeys are using these group-or cliquespecific social conventions to test the quality of their social relationships.