By Stuart Blackman

Published: Wednesday, 04 May 2022 at 12:00 am


New research shows that spider monkeys routinely consume fermenting fruit, backing up the notion that humans inherited our proclivity for alcohol from our primate ancestors – the so-called “drunken monkey hypothesis.”

It’s well known that certain non-human primates enjoy a drop of the hard stuff. Chimpanzees are known to raid stocks of palm wine brewed by villagers and feral vervet monkeys in the Caribbean are famous for stealing alcoholic drinks from bars.