An attempt to prove that Dutch chimpanzees can pick up the Scottish accent when they move to a colony in Scotland is flawed according to experts from Germany, the UK and the USA. The new study was co-authored by Dr. Brandon Wheeler (a Biological Anthropology lecturer from the University of Kent’s School of Anthropology and Conservation). He and his colleagues found that the analysis had several major flaws. He said that the German Primate Centre in Gottingen, and the University of New York had also reported this. (Photo credit: Emma K Wallace). Emma from the Scottish group. Photo credit to Jamie Norris. – They did not consider the fact that the initial vocalizations for both groups were very similar. Moreover, the vocalizations didn’t change much over the study period. This research, which was published in the February issue of Current Biology, focused on two groups of chimps at Edinburgh Zoo. The one group was new to the UK, the other has been in captivity for many years. The investigators claimed over a three-year period that recently arrived chimps altered their communication about apples to sound like those that were held captive for many years. Researchers concluded that new chimps adopted a Scottish accent. Pan troglodytes, or Chimpanzees are found in wild forests in West and Central Africa. They live in large groups of over 100 people. They will split up into small groups during the day, to move and feed. Image: Edinburgh Zoo. The original authors of this study claimed that they had found the first evidence of chimps learning different sounds for the same object. This was a significant finding in language evolution research. This study attracted the attention of scientists, linguists and other experts around the world. The original conclusion was deemed’misplaced’. However, the latest Review, published in Current Biology also suggests that these initial conclusions are wrong. After closer examination of data, Dr. Julia Fischer from Germany’s Primate Center and Professor James P. Higham from New York University found that both the original range of calls the chimps gave in response to apples was largely the same. Only a handful of Dutch chimps’ calls were within the same range as the Scottish chimps. The researchers found that there had been a statistically significant shift in calls between the Dutch and Scottish chimpanzees. However, the data was not biologically strong. They noted that such modulation is well-known in animal vocalizations and is present in most primate calls, as well as in calls from goats. The authors stated in a summary that they were not sure the researchers controlled for arousal. They also noted that vocal characteristics between the two groups overlapped at the start of their study. We also doubt the claim of the authors that the finding’sheds light on the evolution history of human referential terms’. Citation: Julia Fischer, Brandon C. Wheeler, & James P. Higham. Current Biology. Volume 25, Issue . pR 1028-R 1029.. 2 November, 2015. DOI: http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.cub.2015.09.010. Video: Chimps speaking with a Scottish Accent This video is from the February study 2015.
