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Stacking of blocks by chimpanzees: developmental processes and physical understanding

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Abstract

The stacking-block task has been used to assess cognitive development in both humans and chimpanzees. The present study reports three aspects of stacking behavior in chimpanzees: spontaneous development, acquisition process following training, and physical understanding assessed through a cylindrical-block task. Over 3 years of longitudinal observation of block manipulation, one of three infant chimpanzees spontaneously started to stack up cubic blocks at the age of 2 years and 7 months. The other two infants began stacking up blocks at 3 years and 1 month, although only after the introduction of training by a human tester who rewarded stacking behavior. Cylindrical blocks were then introduced to assess physical understanding in object–object combinations in three infant (aged 3–4) and three adult chimpanzees. The flat surfaces of cylinders are suitable for stacking, while the rounded surface is not. Block manipulation was described using sequential codes and analyzed focusing on failure, cause, and solution in the task. Three of the six subjects (one infant and two adults) stacked up cylindrical blocks efficiently: frequently changing the cylinders’ orientation without contacting the round side to other blocks. Rich experience in stacking cubes may facilitate subjects’ stacking of novel, cylindrical shapes from the beginning. The other three subjects were less efficient in stacking cylinders and used variable strategies to achieve the goal. Nevertheless, they began to learn the effective way of stacking over the course of testing, after about 15 sessions (75 trials).

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Notes

  1. Combinatory manipulation has been of interest to researchers as a prominent feature of object manipulation potentially shedding light on cognitive capability. Several terms have been used by different authors to describe the behavior of relating a detached object to another object or substrate: combinatory manipulation (Fragaszy and Adams-Curtis 1991), combinatorial manipulation (Westergaard 1993; Westergaard and Suomi 1994), secondary manipulation (Torigoe 1985), and orienting manipulation (Takeshita and Walraven 1996). The term “object–object combination” was used by Hayashi and Matsuzawa (2003) to refer to the behavior of combining multiple detached objects. Hayashi et al. (2006) reviewed the terms of object manipulation including combinatory manipulation.

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Acknowledgements

The present study was supported by grants from the Ministry of Education, Science, and Culture in Japan (#12002009 and #16002001), from the biodiversity research of the 21COE (A14), and from JSPS core-to-core program, HOPE. Preparation of the manuscript was supported by Research Fellowship 16-1059 from the Japan Society for the Promotion of Science for Young Scientists. Special thanks are due to Tetsuro Matsuzawa (who conducted the face-to-face tests with the subjects Ai and Akira, and sessions 1–10 with Ayumu) for supervision in the course of conducting experiments and manuscript preparation. I would also like to thank Masaki Tomonaga (who conducted sessions 1–7 with Cleo), Masayuki Tanaka (who tested Pan and conducted sessions 1–7 with Pal), Hideko Takeshita, and Masako Myowa-Yamakoshi for their support and helpful comments. I am grateful to Dora Biro for support given in the course of revising the manuscript. The daily running of experiments was supported by Sana Inoue, Etsuko Nogami, Laura Martinez, Yuu Mizuno, Tomoko Takashima, Tomoko Imura, Toyomi Matsuno, Shinya Yamamoto, and Tomomi Ochiai. Thanks are also due to Kiyonori Kumazaki, Norihiko Maeda, Shino Yamauchi, Juri Suzuki, and Akino Kato for the daily care of the chimpanzees. The present experiment complied with the laws of Japan, and housing and feeding conditions were in accordance with the Guide for the Care and Use of Laboratory Primates produced by the Primate Research Institute, Kyoto University (2nd ed., 2002).

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. JSPS Research Fellow, Section of Language and Intelligence, Primate Research Institute, Kyoto University, 41 Kanrin, Inuyama, Aichi, 484-8506, Japan

    Misato Hayashi

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  1. Misato Hayashi
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Correspondence to Misato Hayashi.

Appendices

Appendix

Ayumu: first session

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Pal: first session

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0P0/1P00/3U100/3M/1A/3CB/1P100//

1M/1CM/2U0/1P0/0P10/3U010/3CM/3CB/1P010/1A//

3T/0P1/3T/0D01/0P0/1P00/3CB/1P100/1A/1D1100/1M/3CB/2U100/1P100/1A//

1P0/3U10/3CB/1P10/0U110/0M/0CB/0P110/0A/-3L/0,3M/0P0/3CB/1P00/3M/3CB/1P100/

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Hayashi, M. Stacking of blocks by chimpanzees: developmental processes and physical understanding. Anim Cogn 10, 89–103 (2007). https://doi.org/10.1007/s10071-006-0040-9

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