Suborder: Platyrrhini | Superfamily: Ceboidea | Family: Cebidae | Subfamily: Atelinae

Members of the Atelinae subfamily are the largest of the Platyrrhine infraorder. They are distinctive in that the undersides of their tails are covered with dermatoglyphics?, analogous to our fingerprints. This gives their tails a better grip on branches as they move through the branches or suspend themselves. They are frugivorous? and will travel long distances to find the fruit upon which they subsist. All members of the Atelinae subfamily are diurnal? and arboreal?. They spend most of their time in the canopy? of the forest.

The thumbs of spider monkeys are either reduced or sometimes missing altogether. This is an adaptation for brachiation, since they use their hands as hooks to swing from branch to branch and opposable thumbs would hinder this process. Spider monkeys have long, slender limbs with slightly longer forelimbs. They have a fission-fusion? social structure.

Woolly monkeys, as their name implies, have short, dense pelage?. Their rounded heads and robust brow ridges give woolly monkeys a very human-like appearance. Woolly monkeys live in multimale, multifemale groups. They live mostly along the Atlantic coast of South America and the destruction of their habitat since Europeans settled there 500 years ago has rendered them critically endangered.

The woolly spider monkey has characteristics of the above two monkeys. The pelage of the woolly spider monkey is short and dense, but their limbs are long and slender. They are reported to be non-aggressive and greet familiar conspecifics? with a hug. Occassionally, woolly spider monkeys will cross open ground quadrupedally?.

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