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There are costs to being of a high rank in a hierarchical group which offset the benefits. The most common costs to high-ranking individuals are higher metabolic rates and higher levels of stress hormones.<ref name="Huntingford"/> In [[great tit]]s and [[European pied flycatcher|pied flycatcher]]s, high-ranking individuals experience higher resting metabolic rates and therefore need to consume more food in order to maintain fitness and activity levels than do subordinates in their groups. The energetic costs of defending territory, mates, and other resources can be very consuming and cause high-ranking individuals, who spend more time in these activities, to lose body mass over long periods of dominance. Therefore, their physical condition decreases the longer they spend partaking in these high-energy activities, and they lose rank as a function of age.<ref name="Huntingford"/>
In wild male baboons, the highest-ranking male, also known as the alpha, experiences high levels of both testosterone and glucocorticoid, which indicates that high-ranking males undergo higher levels of stress which reduces fitness. Reduced health and longevity occurs because these two hormones have immunosuppressant activity, which reduces survival and presents opportunities for parasitic infestation and other health risks. This reduced fitness due to the alpha position results in individuals maintaining high rank for shorter periods of time and having an overall reduced health and longevity from the physical strain and costs of the position.<ref name="Gesquiere">{{cite journal |last1=Gesquiere |first1=Laurence R. |last2=Learn |first2=Niki H. |last3=Simao |first3=Carolina M. |last4=Onyango |first4=Patrick O. |last5=Alberts |first5=Susan C. |last6=Altmann |first6=Jeanne |display-authors=3 |year=2011 |title=Life at the Top: Rank and Stress in Wild Male Baboons |journal=Science |volume=333 |issue=6040 |pages=357–60 |doi=10.1126/science.1207120 |pmid=21764751 |pmc=3433837 |bibcode=2011Sci...333..357G }}</ref>
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