Invitation to Psychology

Chapter 7 Thinking and Intelligence 257

Perhaps, however, some animals could

acquire language if they got a little help from

their human friends. Because the vocal tract of

an ape does not permit speech, most researchers

have used innovative approaches that rely on ges-

tures or visual symbols. In one project, chimpan-

zees learned to use, as words, geometric plastic

shapes arranged on a magnetic board (Premack

& Premack, 1983). In another, they learned to

punch symbols on a keyboard connected to a

computer (Rumbaugh, 1977). In yet another,

they learned hundreds of signs in American Sign

Language (ASL) (Fouts & Rigby, 1977; Gardner

& Gardner, 1969).

Animals in these studies learned to fol-

low instructions, answer questions, and make

requests. They even seemed to use their new-

found skills to apologize for being disobedi-

ent, scold their trainers, and talk to themselves.

Koko, a lowland gorilla, reportedly used signs

to say that she felt happy or sad, to refer to past

and future events, to mourn for her dead pet kit-

ten, and to lie when she did something naughty

(Patterson & Linden, 1981). Most important,

the animals combined individual signs or sym-

bols into longer utterances that they had never

seen before.

Unfortunately, in their desire to talk to

the animals and their affection for their pri-

mate friends, some early researchers overinter-

preted the animals’ communications, reading

all sorts of meanings and intentions into a sin-

gle sign or symbol, ignoring scrambled word

order (“banana eat me”), and unwittingly giving

nonverbal cues  that might enable the apes to

respond correctly.

Watch the Video Classic Footage of

Chimpanzees and Sign Language at MyPsychLab

But as researchers have improved their tech-

niques, they have discovered that with careful

training, chimps can indeed acquire some aspects

of language, including the ability to use symbols

to refer to objects. Some animals have also used

signs spontaneously to converse with one another,

suggesting that they are not merely imitating or

trying to get a reward (Van Cantfort & Rimpau,

1982). Bonobos (a type of ape) are especially

adept at language. One bonobo named Kanzi

has learned to understand English words, short

sentences, and keyboard symbols without for-

mal training (Savage-Rumbaugh & Lewin, 1994;

Savage-Rumbaugh, Shanker, & Taylor, 1998).

Kanzi responds correctly to commands such as

“Put the key in the refrigerator” and “Go get the

ball that is outdoors,” even when he has never

and that permit communication about objects

and events that are not present here and now

(see Chapter  3). Do animals have anything

comparable?

Animals do communicate, of course, using

gestures, body postures, facial expressions, vocal-

izations, and odors, and some of these signals have

highly specific meanings. Vervet monkeys seem

to have separate calls to warn each other about

leopards versus eagles versus snakes (Cheney &

Seyfarth, 1985). But vervets cannot combine these

sounds to produce entirely novel utterances, as in

“Look out, Harry, that eagle-eyed leopard is a real

snake-in-the-grass.”

© The New Yorker Collection 1990 Peter Steiner from cartoonbank.com. All Rights Reserved.

Kanzi, a bonobo who answers questions and makes

requests by punching symbols on a specially designed

computer keyboard, also understands short English

sentences. Kanzi is shown here with researcher Sue

Savage-Rumbaugh.

“It’s always ‘Sit,’ ‘Stay,’ ‘Heel’–never

‘Think,’ ‘Innovate,’ ‘Be Yourself.’ ”