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Chimpanzees show the capacity to communicate about combined daily life events
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Poster D85 in Poster Session D, Wednesday, October 25, 4:45 - 6:30 pm CEST, Espace Vieux-Port
Catherine Crockford1, Cedric Girard-Buttoz1, Tatiana Bortolato2, Emiliano Zaccarella3, Roman Wittig1; 1Institute for Cognitive Science Marc Jeannerod, CNRS UMR 5229, Lyon, 2Max Planck Institute for Evolutionary Anthropology, 3Max Planck Institute for Human Cognitive and Brain Sciences
A universal of human language is its versatility in communicating combined information about everyday events. Versatility is achieved through using a diversity of information combination and modification mechanisms. Versatile combinatorial systems of communication can be selected for if (a) several vocal units are flexibly combined into numerous and long vocal sequences and (b) vocal sequences convey information about numerous and diverse daily life events. If (a) and (b) are in place, then we expect to find (c) a diversity of information combinatorial and modification mechanisms. Versatile combinatorial systems combining (a), (b) and (c) have not yet been found in non-human animals. Chimpanzees are a candidate for such a system since they fulfil (a). Here, we test the potential for (b) and (c) in chimpanzees. We analyzed 9391 vocal utterances across the repertoire of 98 wild chimpanzees, Tai Forest, Ivory Coast, and the events occurring during emission. In support of (b), chimpanzees used vocal sequences across a range of daily life events and twice as often during combined than single events. We also found a positive correlation between the diversity of utterances and the diversity of events. In support of (c), when focusing on two-unit utterances (bigrams) and the events during which the bigrams were uttered, we found patterns consistent with several information modification mechanisms found in other animal species: new information creation, combination of information, single call information affixation and ordering effects. Previously, usually only one such mechanism has been found per species. Our results show the potential for chimpanzee utterances to convey combined information about numerous daily life events. This capacity is likely achieved by utilizing a diversity of information modification mechanisms. Whilst we did not assess the construction of meaning through hierarchical ordering, a requirement of syntax, the chimpanzee vocal system may demonstrate a step from which generalized combinatoriality could have evolved.
Topic Areas: Animal Communication and Comparative/Evolutionary Studies, Syntax and Combinatorial Semantics