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Hello! I am Delphine, a behavioural ecologist studying the evolution of social relationships. Animals in a wide variety of species form close bonds, akin to friendships, with some of their group members. With my research, I aim to understand how forming social bonds impacts individual survival and reproduction, and what drives partner choice in the formation of these bonds. 

I am currently a postdoctoral researcher with Lauren Brent at the Center for Research in Animal Behaviour (CRAB) of the University of Exeter (UK). I am part of FriendOrigins, an ERC Consolidator funded project (864461), aimed at understanding the evolutionary origins of friendship. Taking a cross-species comparative approach I investigate how socio-ecological factors shape social relationships. For this, I co-created MacaqueNet, a global grassroots network of macaque researchers, through which we've built a collaborative and standardised cross-species dataset on 14 macaque species. Studying social relationships in macaque species, with known phylogenetic relationships and varying social systems and ecological pressures, we can explicitly address the question of which types of social connectedness are adaptive, and why. 

I also maintain the long-term behavioural database on wild Assamese macaques at the Phu Khieo Wildlife Sanctuary, a field site run by Julia Ostner and Oliver Schülke.
I believe it is crucial to make research accessible to all, and am therefore part of the team behind the Animal Behaviour Collective - a collective of animal behaviour researchers organising microgrants & mentorship for undergraduate & graduate students in animal behaviour. If you can, please consider donating or signing up as a mentor!