Great apes distinguish true from false beliefs in an interactive helping task
Date
05/04/2017Metadata
Show full item recordAbstract
Understanding the behavior of others in a wide variety of circumstances requires an understanding of their psychological states. Humans’ nearest primate relatives, the great apes, understand many psychological states of others, for example, perceptions, goals, and desires. However, so far there is little evidence that they possess the key marker of advanced human social cognition: an understanding of false beliefs. Here we demonstrate that in a nonverbal (implicit) false-belief test which is passed by human 1-year-old infants, great apes as a group, including chimpanzees (Pan troglodytes), bonobos (Pan paniscus), and orangutans (Pongo abelii), distinguish between true and false beliefs in their helping behavior. Great apes thus may possess at least some basic understanding that an agent’s actions are based on her beliefs about reality. Hence, such understanding might not be the exclusive province of the human species.
Citation
Buttelmann , D , Buttelmann , F , Carpenter , M , Call , J & Tomasello , M 2017 , ' Great apes distinguish true from false beliefs in an interactive helping task ' , PLoS One , vol. 12 , no. 4 , e0173793 . https://doi.org/10.1371/journal.pone.0173793
Publication
PLoS One
Status
Peer reviewed
ISSN
1932-6203Type
Journal article
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