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Tool transfers are a form of teaching among chimpanzees
Teaching is a form of high-fidelity social learning that promotes human cumulative culture. Although recently documented in several nonhuman animals, teaching is rare among primates. In this study, we show that wild chimpanzees (Pan troglodytes troglodytes) in the Goualougo Triangle teach tool skill...
Autores principales: | , , , , |
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Formato: | Online Artículo Texto |
Lenguaje: | English |
Publicado: |
Nature Publishing Group
2016
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Materias: | |
Acceso en línea: | https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC5057084/ https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/27725706 http://dx.doi.org/10.1038/srep34783 |
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author | Musgrave, Stephanie Morgan, David Lonsdorf, Elizabeth Mundry, Roger Sanz, Crickette |
author_facet | Musgrave, Stephanie Morgan, David Lonsdorf, Elizabeth Mundry, Roger Sanz, Crickette |
author_sort | Musgrave, Stephanie |
collection | PubMed |
description | Teaching is a form of high-fidelity social learning that promotes human cumulative culture. Although recently documented in several nonhuman animals, teaching is rare among primates. In this study, we show that wild chimpanzees (Pan troglodytes troglodytes) in the Goualougo Triangle teach tool skills by providing learners with termite fishing probes. Tool donors experienced significant reductions in tool use and feeding, while tool recipients significantly increased their tool use and feeding after tool transfers. These transfers meet functional criteria for teaching: they occur in a learner’s presence, are costly to the teacher, and improve the learner’s performance. Donors also showed sophisticated cognitive strategies that effectively buffered them against potential costs. Teaching is predicted when less costly learning mechanisms are insufficient. Given that these chimpanzees manufacture sophisticated, brush-tipped fishing probes from specific raw materials, teaching in this population may relate to the complexity of these termite-gathering tasks. |
format | Online Article Text |
id | pubmed-5057084 |
institution | National Center for Biotechnology Information |
language | English |
publishDate | 2016 |
publisher | Nature Publishing Group |
record_format | MEDLINE/PubMed |
spelling | pubmed-50570842016-10-24 Tool transfers are a form of teaching among chimpanzees Musgrave, Stephanie Morgan, David Lonsdorf, Elizabeth Mundry, Roger Sanz, Crickette Sci Rep Article Teaching is a form of high-fidelity social learning that promotes human cumulative culture. Although recently documented in several nonhuman animals, teaching is rare among primates. In this study, we show that wild chimpanzees (Pan troglodytes troglodytes) in the Goualougo Triangle teach tool skills by providing learners with termite fishing probes. Tool donors experienced significant reductions in tool use and feeding, while tool recipients significantly increased their tool use and feeding after tool transfers. These transfers meet functional criteria for teaching: they occur in a learner’s presence, are costly to the teacher, and improve the learner’s performance. Donors also showed sophisticated cognitive strategies that effectively buffered them against potential costs. Teaching is predicted when less costly learning mechanisms are insufficient. Given that these chimpanzees manufacture sophisticated, brush-tipped fishing probes from specific raw materials, teaching in this population may relate to the complexity of these termite-gathering tasks. Nature Publishing Group 2016-10-11 /pmc/articles/PMC5057084/ /pubmed/27725706 http://dx.doi.org/10.1038/srep34783 Text en Copyright © 2016, The Author(s) http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/ This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License. The images or other third party material in this article are included in the article’s Creative Commons license, unless indicated otherwise in the credit line; if the material is not included under the Creative Commons license, users will need to obtain permission from the license holder to reproduce the material. To view a copy of this license, visit http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/ |
spellingShingle | Article Musgrave, Stephanie Morgan, David Lonsdorf, Elizabeth Mundry, Roger Sanz, Crickette Tool transfers are a form of teaching among chimpanzees |
title | Tool transfers are a form of teaching among chimpanzees |
title_full | Tool transfers are a form of teaching among chimpanzees |
title_fullStr | Tool transfers are a form of teaching among chimpanzees |
title_full_unstemmed | Tool transfers are a form of teaching among chimpanzees |
title_short | Tool transfers are a form of teaching among chimpanzees |
title_sort | tool transfers are a form of teaching among chimpanzees |
topic | Article |
url | https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC5057084/ https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/27725706 http://dx.doi.org/10.1038/srep34783 |
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