Were you ever called a “little monkey” when you were younger? There could be some truth in it – Dr Catherine Hobaiter and her team at the University of St Andrews found that toddlers and apes use the same gestures.
The study revealed that young children used around 52 actions, including head shaking, poking, stomping, hitting themselves and throwing objects. Apes use about 50 of these signals, meaning they share about 96% of their gestures.
Dr Hobaiter, from the School of Psychology and Neuroscience, said, “Wild chimpanzees, gorillas, bonobos and orangutans all use gestures to communicate their day-to-day requests, but until now there was always one ape missing from the picture – us.”
The researchers observed young chimpanzees in their natural habitat in the Budongo Forest in Uganda, Africa. Toddlers…
