Files in this item
Community-specific evaluation of tool affordances in wild chimpanzees
Item metadata
dc.contributor.author | Gruber, Thibaud | |
dc.contributor.author | Muller, Martin N. | |
dc.contributor.author | Reynolds, Vernon | |
dc.contributor.author | Wrangham, Richard | |
dc.contributor.author | Zuberbuehler, Klaus | |
dc.date.accessioned | 2012-07-25T12:01:04Z | |
dc.date.available | 2012-07-25T12:01:04Z | |
dc.date.issued | 2011-11-03 | |
dc.identifier | 21588229 | |
dc.identifier | cbe68b10-23be-4772-a01e-f191cf10efda | |
dc.identifier | 000300553200001 | |
dc.identifier | 84859762024 | |
dc.identifier.citation | Gruber , T , Muller , M N , Reynolds , V , Wrangham , R & Zuberbuehler , K 2011 , ' Community-specific evaluation of tool affordances in wild chimpanzees ' , Scientific Reports , vol. 1 , 128 , pp. - . https://doi.org/10.1038/srep00128 | en |
dc.identifier.issn | 2045-2322 | |
dc.identifier.other | ORCID: /0000-0001-8378-088X/work/64360645 | |
dc.identifier.uri | https://hdl.handle.net/10023/3013 | |
dc.description.abstract | The notion of animal culture, defined as socially transmitted community-specific behaviour patterns, remains controversial, notably because the definition relies on surface behaviours without addressing underlying cognitive processes. In contrast, human cultures are the product of socially acquired ideas that shape how individuals interact with their environment. We conducted field experiments with two culturally distinct chimpanzee communities in Uganda, which revealed significant differences in how individuals considered the affording parts of an experimentally provided tool to extract honey from a standardised cavity. Firstly, individuals of the two communities found different functional parts of the tool salient, suggesting that they experienced a cultural bias in their cognition. Secondly, when the alternative function was made more salient, chimpanzees were unable to learn it, suggesting that prior cultural background can interfere with new learning. Culture appears to shape how chimpanzees see the world, suggesting that a cognitive component underlies the observed behavioural patterns. | |
dc.format.extent | 7 | |
dc.format.extent | 389511 | |
dc.language.iso | eng | |
dc.relation.ispartof | Scientific Reports | en |
dc.subject | QL Zoology | en |
dc.subject.lcc | QL | en |
dc.title | Community-specific evaluation of tool affordances in wild chimpanzees | en |
dc.type | Journal article | en |
dc.contributor.sponsor | The Leverhulme Trust | en |
dc.contributor.institution | University of St Andrews. School of Psychology and Neuroscience | en |
dc.contributor.institution | University of St Andrews. Institute of Behavioural and Neural Sciences | en |
dc.contributor.institution | University of St Andrews. Centre for Social Learning & Cognitive Evolution | en |
dc.identifier.doi | https://doi.org/10.1038/srep00128 | |
dc.description.status | Peer reviewed | en |
dc.identifier.grantnumber | F/00 268/AP | en |
This item appears in the following Collection(s)
Items in the St Andrews Research Repository are protected by copyright, with all rights reserved, unless otherwise indicated.