Abstract
The present study shows that chemical signals are used as sociosexual communication among prosimians, New World as well as Old World monkeys. The abundance of scent glands and of behaviors concerned with their use exhibits that olfactory communication is of great importance in prosimians and callitrichids. Although cebids share a reduction in the complexity of the gland structure with Old World monkeys, the relative scarcity of specialized scent-marking behaviors is complemented by variable types of urine-concerned behaviors. It suggests that olfactory communication might play a more powerful role in social interaction in general throughout the order primates than is commonly supposed.
