Is the 'alpha male' a myth? New research in primates may debunk theory

You've heard of the term alpha male, the strongest and most dominant in the pack

but what if I told you that idea may have never been real to begin with

A new study is shaking up what we thought we knew about power in the animal kingdom

and even how we define it in humans. The study published Monday in PNAS shows researchers studied over 100 primate species

including a range of monkeys and lemurs. They found that male-dominated hierarchies are rarer than you'd think, and in fact, females often share or even contest power

In only 17% of populations, males won the vast majority of female-male conflicts

In the rest, either power was shared or females took the lead

The original alpha male concept came from 1970s wolf research based on captive animals, but even the biologists who coined it later recanted it

In actuality, the way they get there is merely by mating with a member of the opposite sex, producing a bunch of offspring, which are the rest of the pack then, and becoming the natural leaders that way, just like with a pair of humans producing a family

It describes a lone wolf who operates outside traditional hierarchies. The term is both praised and criticized and even made its way into kids media

Let's say your friend is doing their own thing, focusing on their goals and not worrying about what others think

You can say you're such a sigma. A 3D animated video of Dora the Explorer described a sigma as confident, a leader and a trendsetter

But that post was removed after viewers blasted it online. And as for us humans, well, researchers say we fall somewhere in the middle, neither strictly male nor female dominated

With Straight Arrow News, I'm Kennedy Felton. Download our app or visit san.com for more