When DOMINANCE ranks are stable amongst pairs of individuals in a group, for each sex there is usually one individual who is dominant to all others. This is called the alpha individual (sometimes the others are termed beta, gamma and so on). In monkeys...

In social animals, the alpha male or alpha female is the individual in the community whom the others follow and defer to. Where one male and one female fulfill this role, they are referred to as the alpha pair. In some groups, the alpha males and...