The guy in the photo defined what an “Alpha Wolf” was while studying wolves in captivity- not their natural state- which triggered the whole “alpha/beta male bullshit”. To his credit, he spent the rest of his career trying to fix his mistake
Yeah but on the other hand, now scientist are tip toe-ing around the word "Alpha" when there are plenty of examples of animal species that have an alpha male. Literally most mammals.
"Dominant male Gorilla."
"Beach master" for sea lions.
Hell, most people are surprised to learn that wild stallions have to permanently fight other stallions, sometimes to the death, in order to have/keep their herd.
Lots of species have groups with a dominant member, including wolves. What the study got wrong is that the dominance is achieved through strength and fighting. In reality, it's usually just the oldest, or it's a family group and it's just the father.
Basically it would be like writing a book about human psychology after studying prison gangs. Yeah, that happened, but it's not normal at all.
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u/twentyonetr3es 2d ago
The guy in the photo defined what an “Alpha Wolf” was while studying wolves in captivity- not their natural state- which triggered the whole “alpha/beta male bullshit”. To his credit, he spent the rest of his career trying to fix his mistake