Scholars@Duke
Vanessa Woods

Vanessa Woods

Research Scientist
Evolutionary Anthropology
Box 90383, Durham, NC 27708-0383
Rm 004A Biological Sciences, Durham, NC 27703

Current Duke Appointments & Affiliations

Recent News Items

Published July 13, 2026
Where Science Meets Snouts
Published December 4, 2025
Inside the Minds of Puppies: How Do They Develop Their Thinking Skills?

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Recent Scholarly Works

Bonobo but not chimpanzee infants use socio-sexual contact with peers.

Journal article Primates; journal of primatology · April 2011 Bonobos have been observed to use socio-sexual behavior at higher frequency than chimpanzees. Little is known about the developmental influences that shape this behavior in bonobos. We compared the social sexual behavior of wild-born bonobo (n = 8) and chi ... Full text Cite

Think outside the lab: sanctuaries are the future of research on captive great apes

Journal article Encyclopaedia of Animal Behaviour and Welfar · June 2008 Cite

Tolerance allows bonobos to outperform chimpanzees on a cooperative task.

Journal article Current biology : CB · April 2007 To understand constraints on the evolution of cooperation, we compared the ability of bonobos and chimpanzees to cooperatively solve a food-retrieval problem. We addressed two hypotheses. The "emotional-reactivity hypothesis" predicts that bonobos will coo ... Full text Cite
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Recent Grants

Longitudinal Cognitive and Emotional Development in Working Dog Puppies

ResearchLaboratory Manager · Awarded by National Institutes of Health · 2019 - 2026

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