Abstract
This study focuses on the development of spontaneous object manipulation in three infant chimpanzees during their first 2 years of life. The three infants were raised by their biological mothers who lived among a group of chimpanzees. A human tester conducted a series of cognitive tests in a triadic situation where mothers collaborated with the researcher during the testing of the infants. Four tasks were presented, taken from normative studies of cognitive development of Japanese infants: inserting objects into corresponding holes in a box, seriating nesting cups, inserting variously shaped objects into corresponding holes in a template, and stacking up wooden blocks. The mothers had already acquired skills to perform these manipulation tasks. The infants were free to observe the mothers' manipulative behavior from immediately after birth. We focused on object–object combinations that were made spontaneously by the infant chimpanzees, without providing food reinforcement for any specific behavior that the infants performed. The three main findings can be summarized as follows. First, there was precocious appearance of object–object combination in infant chimpanzees: the age of onset (8–11 months) was comparable to that in humans (around 10 months old).Second, object–object combinations in chimpanzees remained at a low frequency between 11 and 16 months, then increased dramatically at the age of approximately 1.5 years. At the same time, the accuracy of these object–object combinations also increased. Third, chimpanzee infants showed inserting behavior frequently and from an early age but they did not exhibit stacking behavior during their first 2 years of life, in clear contrast to human data.
This is a preview of subscription content, log in via an institution to check access.
Similar content being viewed by others
References
Bayley N (1969) Bayley scales of infant development. The Psychological Corporation, New York
Fragaszy DM, Adams-Curtis LE (1991) Generative aspects of manipulation in tufted capuchin monkeys (Cebus apella). J Comp Psychol 105:387–397
Goodall J (1964) Tool-using and aimed throwing in a community of free-living chimpanzees. Nature 201:1264–1266
Goodall J (1986) The chimpanzees of Gombe: patterns of behavior. Harvard University Press, Cambridge
Hirata S, Celli ML (2003) Role of mothers in the acquisition of tool use behaviors by captive infant chimpanzees. Anim Cogn (in press)
Ikuzawa M (2000) Developmental diagnostic tests for children, 2nd edn. (in Japanese). Nakanishiya, Kyoto
Inoue-Nakamura N, Matsuzawa T (1997) Development of stone tool use by wild chimpanzees (Pan troglodytes). J Comp Psychol 111:159–173
King WL, Seegmiller B (1973) Performance of 14- to 22-month-old black, firstborn male infants on two tests of cognitive development: The Bayley Scales and the Infant Psychological Development Scale. Dev Psychol 8:317–326
Kopp CB, Sigman M, Parmelee AH (1974) Longitudinal study of sensorimotor development. Dev Psychol 10:687–695
Matsuzawa T (1994) Field experiments on use of stone tools by chimpanzees in the wild. In: Wrangham RW, McGrew WC, de Waal FBM, Heltne PG (eds) Chimpanzee cultures. Harvard University Press, Mass., pp 351–370
Matsuzawa T (2001) Primate foundations of human intelligence: a view of tool use in nonhuman primates and fossil hominids. In: Matsuzawa T (ed) Primate origins of human cognition and behavior. Springer, Tokyo Berlin Heidelberg, pp 3–25
Matsuzawa T (2003) Ai project: a retrospective of 25 years research on chimpanzee intelligence. Anim Cogn (in press)
Matsuzawa T, Biro D, Humle T, Inoue-Nakamura N, Tonooka R, Yamakoshi G (2001) Emergence of culture in wild chimpanzees: education by master-apprenticeship. In: Matsuzawa T (ed) Primate origins of human cognition and behavior. Springer, Tokyo Berlin Heidelberg, pp 557–574
McGrew WC (1992) Chimpanzee material culture: implications for human evolution. Cambridge University Press, Cambridge
Myowa-Yamakoshi M, Matsuzawa T (1999) Factors influencing imitation of manipulatory actions in chimpanzees (Pan troglodytes). J Comp Psychol 113:128–136
Myowa-Yamakoshi M, Matsuzawa T (2000) Imitation of intentional manipulatory actions in chimpanzees (Pan troglodytes). J Comp Psychol 114:381–391
Nishida T (1990) The chimpanzees of the Mahale Mountains: sexual and life history strategies. University of Tokyo Press, Tokyo
Ochiai T, Matsuzawa T (1997) Planting trees in an outdoor compound of chimpanzees for an enriched environment. In: Hare VJ, Worley KE (eds) Proceedings of the 3rd International Conference on Environmental Enrichment. The Shape of Enrichment, Orlando, Fla., pp 355–364
Potì P (1996) Spatial aspects of spontaneous object grouping by young chimpanzees (Pan troglodytes). Int J Primatol 17:101–116
Potì P, Spinozzi G (1994) Early sensorimotor development in chimpanzees (Pan troglodytes). J Comp Psychol 108:93–103
Schaik CP van, Deaner RO, Merrill MY (1999) The conditions for tool use in primates: implications for the evolution of material culture. J Hum Evol 36:719–741
Takeshita H (2001) Development of combinatory manipulation in chimpanzee infants (Pan troglodytes). Anim Cogn 4:335–345
Takeshita H, Walraven V (1996) A comparative study of the variety and complexity of object manipulation in captive chimpanzees (Pan troglodytes) and bonobos (Pan paniscus). Primates 37:423–441
Takeshita H, Tanaka M, Matsuzawa T (1989) Development of postural reactions and object manipulation in primate infants (in Japanese with English summary). Primate Res 5:111–120
Tanaka M, Tanaka S (1982) Developmental diagnosis of human infants: from 6 to 18 months (in Japanese). Ootsuki, Tokyo
Torigoe T (1985) Comparison of object manipulation among 74 species of non-human primates. Primates 26:182–194
Uzgiris IC, Hunt JM (1975) Assessment in infancy: ordinal scales of psychological development. University of Illinois Press, Urbana
Vauclair J, Bard KA (1983) Development of manipulations with objects in ape and human infants. J Hum Evol 12:631–645
Westergaard GC (1993) Development of combinatorial manipulation in infant baboons (Papio cynocephalus anubis). J Comp Psychol 107:34–38
Westergaard GC, Suomi SJ (1994) Hierarchical complexity of combinatorial manipulation in capuchin monkeys (Cebus apella). Am J Primatol 32:171–176
Whiten A, Goodall J, McGrew WC, Nishida T, Reynolds V, Sugiyama Y, Tutin CEG, Wrangham RW, Boesch C (1999) Cultures in chimpanzees. Nature 399:682–685
Yamakoshi G. (2001) Ecology of tool use in wild chimpanzees: toward reconstruction of early hominid evolution. In: Matsuzawa T (ed) Primate origins of human cognition and behavior. Springer, Tokyo Berlin Heidelberg, pp 537–556
Acknowledgements
This study was supported by grants from the Ministry of Education, Science, and Culture in Japan to the second author (#12002009, 10CE2005, and 21COE program A2 to Kyoto University). We would like to thank Masaki Tomonaga, Masayuki Tanaka, Hideko Takeshita, Masuo Koyasu, and Sakiko Yoshikawa for helpful support and suggestions. Special thanks are due to Masako Myowa-Yamakoshi and Yu Mizuno for their advice and help given during the course of conducting experiments. We also thank Dora Biro for help given in the course of revising the manuscript. We are grateful to all of the staff at the Primate Research Institute of Kyoto University who work with the chimpanzees. The present study complies with the laws of Japan.
Author information
Authors and Affiliations
Corresponding author
Rights and permissions
About this article
Cite this article
Hayashi, M., Matsuzawa, T. Cognitive development in object manipulation by infant chimpanzees. Anim Cogn 6, 225–233 (2003). https://doi.org/10.1007/s10071-003-0185-8
Received:
Revised:
Accepted:
Published:
Issue Date:
DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s10071-003-0185-8