Nov 19, 2025 02:20 AM
(This post was last modified: Nov 19, 2025 02:21 AM by C C.)
https://www.eurekalert.org/news-releases/1106275
EXCERPTS: Kissing occurs in a variety of animals, but presents an evolutionary puzzle: it appears to carry high risks, such as disease transmission, while offering no obvious reproductive or survival advantage. Despite kissing carrying cultural and emotional significance in many human societies, up to now researchers have paid little attention to its evolutionary history.
In the new study, the researchers carried out the first attempt to reconstruct the evolutionary history of kissing using a cross-species approach based on the primate family tree. The results indicate that kissing is an ancient trait in the large apes, evolving in the ancestor to that group 21.5 - 16.9 million years ago. Kissing was retained over the course of evolution and is still present in most of the large apes.
The team also found that our extinct human relatives, Neanderthals, were likely to have engaged in kissing too. This finding, together with previous studies showing that humans and Neanderthals shared oral microbes (via saliva transfer) and genetic material (via interbreeding), strongly suggests that humans and Neanderthals kissed one another.
Dr Matilda Brindle, lead author and evolutionary biologist at Oxford’s Department of Biology, said: "This is the first time anyone has taken a broad evolutionary lens to examine kissing. Our findings add to a growing body of work highlighting the remarkable diversity of sexual behaviours exhibited by our primate cousins.”
[...] “While kissing may seem like an ordinary or universal behaviour, it is only documented in 46% of human cultures," said Catherine Talbot, co-author and Assistant Professor in the College of Psychology at Florida Institute of Technology. "The social norms and context vary widely across societies, raising the question of whether kissing is an evolved behaviour or cultural invention. This is the first step in addressing that question.” (MORE - missing details, no ads)
EXCERPTS: Kissing occurs in a variety of animals, but presents an evolutionary puzzle: it appears to carry high risks, such as disease transmission, while offering no obvious reproductive or survival advantage. Despite kissing carrying cultural and emotional significance in many human societies, up to now researchers have paid little attention to its evolutionary history.
In the new study, the researchers carried out the first attempt to reconstruct the evolutionary history of kissing using a cross-species approach based on the primate family tree. The results indicate that kissing is an ancient trait in the large apes, evolving in the ancestor to that group 21.5 - 16.9 million years ago. Kissing was retained over the course of evolution and is still present in most of the large apes.
The team also found that our extinct human relatives, Neanderthals, were likely to have engaged in kissing too. This finding, together with previous studies showing that humans and Neanderthals shared oral microbes (via saliva transfer) and genetic material (via interbreeding), strongly suggests that humans and Neanderthals kissed one another.
Dr Matilda Brindle, lead author and evolutionary biologist at Oxford’s Department of Biology, said: "This is the first time anyone has taken a broad evolutionary lens to examine kissing. Our findings add to a growing body of work highlighting the remarkable diversity of sexual behaviours exhibited by our primate cousins.”
[...] “While kissing may seem like an ordinary or universal behaviour, it is only documented in 46% of human cultures," said Catherine Talbot, co-author and Assistant Professor in the College of Psychology at Florida Institute of Technology. "The social norms and context vary widely across societies, raising the question of whether kissing is an evolved behaviour or cultural invention. This is the first step in addressing that question.” (MORE - missing details, no ads)