Chimps happy to help - but only when said please to!October 14th, 2009 LONDON - Looking for help from a chimp? Don't forget to use the word 'please' in the request. According to a new study, captive chimpanzees willingly help others obtain an out-of-reach snack, but only if they beg for it.
Hyenas smarter than chimps in problem solving: StudySeptember 29th, 2009 WASHINGTON - Simians may outsmart spotted hyenas but when it comes to cooperation and problem solving, hyenas easily beat chimps hands down, says a new study. Captive pairs of spotted hyenas that needed to tug two ropes in unison to earn a food reward, cooperated successfully and learned the manoeuvres quickly with no training.
Hyenas better than chimps in cooperative problem solvingSeptember 29th, 2009 WASHINGTON - Spotted hyenas have been found to outperform chimpanzees in cooperative problem-solving tests in a new study. Christine Drea, an evolutionary anthropologist at Duke University, says that captive pairs of spotted hyenas (Crocuta crocuta) that needed to tug two ropes in unison to earn a food reward cooperated successfully, and learnt the manoeuvres quickly with no training.
Chimps can "catch" yawn from yawning toonsSeptember 9th, 2009 LONDON - Yawning is so contagious that it can provoke teeth-baring yawns in chimpanzees, a new research has found. "Contagious yawning" is well known among humans, and previous research has shown that chimps are not immune to its suggestive influence either.
Baby chimps better at controlling emotions than human babiesSeptember 7th, 2009 LONDON - When it comes to controlling emotions, baby chimps do it better than human babies, concludes a new study. The research, which investigated the facial expressions of young chimpanzees, may explain why some babies cry so much and are so inconsolable.
2 chimps evacuating from wildfire recaptured after escaping from temporary shelter at LA zooSeptember 1st, 2009 Chimps evacuating from LA fire tried to escapeLOS ANGELES — Two chimpanzees that were evacuated from an animal sanctuary threatened by wildfire have been recaptured after they escaped from their crates while being unloaded at the Los Angeles Zoo. Zoo spokesman Jason Jacobs says the female chimps fled Tuesday afternoon, prompting zoo visitors to evacuate.
Wild chimps found infected with AIDSJuly 23rd, 2009 WASHINGTON - Although the AIDS virus (HIV-1) infected the human population through chimpanzees, scientists long believed that chimps didn't develop the disease. But new research reveals otherwise.
Like humans, chimps too focus on facesJuly 23rd, 2009 WASHINGTON - Chimpanzees are wired to respond to faces in a similar manner to humans, suggests a new study in BioMed Central's open access journal Frontiers in Zoology. To reach the conclusion, Masaki Tomonaga and Tomoko Imura from the Primate Research Institute at Kyoto University, Japan, tested the effects of a series of different images on chimps' reaction times.
'Missing link' seen in primate form of AIDS virus killing chimps; other apes unharmedJuly 22nd, 2009 Scientists find HIV's 'missing link' in ill chimpsWASHINGTON — Scientists believe they have found a "missing link" in the evolution of the virus that causes AIDS. It bridges the gap between the infection that does no harm to most monkeys and the one that kills millions of people.
Chimps can learn to make their own tools watching video demosJuly 1st, 2009 LONDON - St Andrews University researchers in Scotland have shown that chimpanzees can be learn how to make their own tools by watching demonstrations on video. For this work, the researchers trained a chimpanzee to make a long pole for prizing out-of-reach fruit from a tree, and then filmed the animal constructing the handy tool from a variety of different parts.
Chimps tend to remember the exact location of favourite fruit treesJune 9th, 2009 LONDON - Chimpanzees have an inherent spatial memory that makes them remember the exact location of all their favourite fruit trees, according to a study. In fact, primatologists have found that their spatial memory is so precise that they can find a single tree among more than 12,000 others within a patch of forest.
Sweet tooth drives chimps to develop own brand of toolkitsMay 31st, 2009 LONDON - Chimps are so nuts about honey that, even though they've no access to a hardware store, they construct their own brand of toolkits when foraging for snacks from beehives, a new study has found. A research team, which was led by Christophe Boesch of the Max Planck Institute for Evolutionary Anthropology in Leipzig, Germany, studied chimps living in Loango National Park in Gabon.
Our ancestors were poor climbersApril 14th, 2009 WASHINGTON - A new study from Worcester State College in Massachusetts has revealed that our ancient human ancestors were poor climbers and they traded their ability of climbing trees for the power to walk on two legs. According to anthropologist Jeremy DeSilva, early humans lacked the ankle structure that assists chimps- our closest living animal relatives - in climbing.
Why chimps are 4 times stronger than humansMarch 31st, 2009 WASHINGTON - In a new research, a scientist has suggested that chimpanzees are four times stronger than humans because our nervous systems exert more control over our muscles, thus preventing great feats of strength. The research was done by evolutionary biologist Alan Walker, a professor at Penn State University.
Chimps too possess human abilities to plan for future dangerMarch 12th, 2009 WASHINGTON - It's not only humans who plan for future events, chimpanzees too possess the ability to prepare in advance for any danger or calamity, says a new study. Researchers described such behaviour after their decade long observation in which they saw that chimpanzees in a zoo calmly collect stones and fashion concrete discs that they would later use to hurl at zoo visitors.
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