Although we as human beings tend to preen ourselves on our perceived
superior memory ability in comparison to ‘other’ animals, test results gained
at Kyoto University’s Primate Research Institute suggest otherwise. Chimpanzees
appear to be far better in memorizing than any human when it comes to numbers. Tetsuro Matsuzawa, professor of language and
intelligence at the aforementioned institute, has conducted several studies
with chimpanzees, in which he let them order numbers in consecutive progression
from one to nine. These numbers appeared on a computer touch screen for only
split seconds, leaving white squares, which the chimpanzees were supposed to
touch in the right succession. Especially Ayumu, a chimpanzee that gained
stardom through the studies, was able to fulfill the task with an amazing
reliability. So far, no human was able to surpass Ayumu in his performance.
Matsuzawa sees the reason for Ayumu’s success in the chimpanzee’s good
memory skills – a view that is challenged by psychologist Nicholas Humphrey who
suggests a different explanation: Ayumu could experience what is called
“synesthesia”, the ability to see numbers in colors. This way, the after-effect
of the ‘colored’ numbers could show on the white squares, which then would make
it easy for the chimpanzee to tap on the ‘colors’ in a learned order. So far, this
ability has been only linked to humans due to their capacity of building chains
of numbers or letters, but why should it not also apply to a chimpanzee that
has learned how to count?
To date, however, Matsuzawa hasn’t shown any interest in testing this
possibility, although the test Humphrey proposes sounds simple: color the
squares to begin with and then observe, if the chimpanzee scores the same test
results as he usually does with black numbers on white squares.
Although we as human beings tend to preen ourselves on our perceived superior memory [foc] in comparison to that of [foc] ‘other’ animals, test results gained at Kyoto University’s Primate Research Institute suggest otherwise. Chimpanzees appear to be far better at [prep] memorizing than any human when it comes to numbers. Tetsuro Matsuzawa, professor of language and intelligence at the aforementioned institute, has conducted several studies with chimpanzees, in which he let them order numbers in consecutive progression from one to nine. These numbers appeared on a computer touch screen for only split seconds, leaving white squares, which the chimpanzees were supposed to touch in the right succession. Especially Ayumu, a chimpanzee that gained stardom through the studies, was able to fulfill the task with an amazing reliability. So far, no human was able to surpass Ayumu in his performance.
AntwortenLöschenMatsuzawa sees the reason for Ayumu’s success in the chimpanzee’s good memory skills – a view that is challenged by psychologist Nicholas Humphrey, [P] who suggests a different explanation: Ayumu could experience what is called ‘synaesthesia’, [P/St-continue with BE as above][Sp-also BE] the ability to associate the senses with each other, or to associate abstract concepts like numbers with finely discreet sensory inputs like the infinite colors of the spectrum. [foc,coh,facts]This way, the after-effect of the ‘colored’ numbers could show on the white squares, which then would make it easy for the chimpanzee to tap on the ‘colors’ in a learned order. So far, this ability has been only linked to humans, explaining [E,coh] their capacity for [prep] building chains of numbers or letters, but why should it not also apply to a chimpanzee that has learned how to count?
To date, however, Matsuzawa hasn’t shown any interest in testing this possibility, although the test Humphrey proposes sounds simple: color the squares to begin with and then observe, if the chimpanzee scores the same test results as he usually does with black numbers on white squares.
Really interesting—and very well written!