The researchers studied the behavior of the monkeys who made mistakes and found that embarrassment may play a role in calming social situations and elicit behaviors such as avoiding eye contact and blushing. In other words, he discovered that animals, like humans, are shy.
You can spot a shy person from a mile away, but the emotional state in animals can be more difficult to identify. Mark Bekoff, in an article he wrote in the journal BioScience, states that a chimpanzee watches a situation that can be compared to shame, based on an observation by world-renowned primatologist Jane Goodall. Goodall saw a young chimpanzee named Freud fall on his face after swinging on a branch. The young chimpanzee quickly glanced at his uncle Figan to see if anyone had seen him fall. This is an understandable reaction for anyone who stumbles upon in front of a group of people. A similar reaction was seen in a male monkey who fell into a ditch after mating.
For shame to evolve between different animal groups, something known as convergent evolution must have taken place. This should have a purpose that improves the harmony of the animal in its environment. In a 2000 article by Dacher Keltner and Cameron Anderson, shame can serve as an appeasement to improve social relationships when things go wrong.
It’s normal to dislike the feeling of shyness, but making yourself look silly can be comforting by triggering a laughter response in other people. Some of Keltner’s previous research has uncovered appeasement behaviors seen in humans and nonhuman primates. These behaviors include averting eyes and reddening of the skin.
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