Do animals other than humans kiss?
'Kissing' has been practiced between humans for a long time, and there are descriptions of kissing on
Do other animals kiss? | Live Science
https://www.livescience.com/animals/do-other-animals-kiss
When a particular behavior like kissing is widespread in human society across time and culture, it makes sense to ask, 'Do other animal species do the same thing?' and 'Does the behavior have an evolutionary origin?' And when considering this question about kissing, it is first necessary to define what kind of behavior kissing is.
The term 'kissing' covers a wide range of topics, from a light kiss where the lips are just touching the cheek to a deep kiss where the tongues are intertwined. On the other hand, most people would not consider the act of pressing lips together during artificial respiration to be a kiss, even though it is physically the same as a kiss.
'In general, human kissing, whether sexual, romantic, or platonic, needs to express some kind of positive social emotion,' Live Science says.
The most familiar example for humans is when dogs lick their companions or owners. Physically, you could say that 'dogs kiss,' but for dogs, this is an action that has a different purpose from human kissing, such as grooming and remembering scents. Considering that even between humans, the touching of lips during artificial respiration is not called a kiss, a dog's licking of another animal is certainly a 'kiss-like behavior,' but it cannot be said to be a 'kiss.'
In addition, giraffes have been known to butt their necks together and sometimes rub their faces and lips against each other, but this behavior is not a sign of affection but a ritualistic fight called 'necking,' which males perform to show dominance.
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Many animals are anatomically unable to kiss with their lips pressed together like humans, so the only animal species that can kiss like humans are primates. Bonobos , which are considered to be one of the most closely related primate species to humans, are known to have intense sexual behavior like humans, and to engage in pseudo-copulation to relieve tension between individuals.
Vanessa Woods , an evolutionary anthropologist at Duke University, said that bonobos often kiss for long periods of time when sharing food or grooming, and that kissing can be considered a 'barometer of relationships. In fact, kissing-like behavior is so common during primate grooming that a paper was published in 2024 arguing that 'kissing may be an evolutionary remnant of grooming.'
The final stage of grooming in non-human primates is often the act of using the lips to suck out insects or debris from the other person's fur. Adriano Lameira , an associate professor of psychology at the University of Warwick and author of the 2024 paper, believes that although humans evolved thinner fur and therefore no longer needed grooming, behaviors like kissing may have remained as a way to communicate strong social bonds.
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'Kissing is not just a romantic or cultural phenomenon, but an evolutionary vestige of social bonding in primates,' Lameira told Live Science in an email. However, Woods said he thinks bonobo kissing may have origins other than the transmission of social bonds, since it occurs not only during grooming but also when sharing food.
'While the evolutionary origins of kissing remain a mystery, one thing is clear: While other animals may engage in behaviors that resemble kissing in form and function, the extent to which humans kiss sets them apart from other animals,' Live Science said.
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