Robust retention and transfer of tool construction techniques in chimpanzees (Pan troglodytes).

Abstract

Long-term memory can be critical to a species’ survival in environments with seasonal and even longer-term cycles of resource availability. The present, longitudinal study investigated whether complex tool behaviors used to gain an out-of-reach reward, following a hiatus of about 3 years and 7 months since initial experiences with a tool use task, were retained and subsequently executed more quickly by experienced than by naïve chimpanzees. Ten of the 11 retested chimpanzees displayed impressive long-term procedural memory, creating elongated tools using the same methods employed years previously, either combining 2 tools or extending a single tool. The complex tool behaviors were also transferred to a different task context, showing behavioral flexibility. This represents some of the first evidence for appreciable long-term procedural memory, and improvements in the utility of complex tool manufacture in chimpanzees. Such long-term procedural memory and behavioral flexibility have important implications for the longevity and transmission of behavioral traditions.

Is Overimitation a Uniquely Human Phenomenon? Insights From Human Children as Compared to Bonobos

“…Debate over the uniqueness of human culture and the role that imitation plays in its evolutionary and ontogenetic development has become the focus of increasing research attention (Caldwell & Millen, 2009;Meltzoff & Prinz, 2002;Tennie, Call, & Tomasello, 2009;Tomasello, 1999;Whiten, 2016). In particular, comparative research has attempted to identify what makes human culture special as compared to that of other great apes, and to identify similarities and differences in the underlying social learning mechanisms (Tomasello, 1996;Tomasello, Savage-Rumbaugh, & Kruger, 1993;Vale et al, 2016;Whiten, 2013;Whiten, 2016). Imitation, which in this article we define as the faithful copying of others' body movements, has elicited particular attention as it has been proposed to form a core component of human culture, enabling the acquisition of causally opaque material culture and actionbased cultures (e.g., gestures and dance), as well as contributing to their accumulation over time (Acerbi & Tennie, 2016;Dean, Kendal, Schapiro, Thierry, & Laland, 2012;Gergely & Csibra, 2006;Tennie et al, 2009; but see Caldwell & Millen, 2009;Caldwell, Schillinger, Evans, & Hopper, 2012;Morin, 2015).…”

Remembering past exchanges: Apes fail to use social cues

“…This adds to the growing literature on long-term memory in primates, which has already shown primates ability to remember events and spatial locations (Kano & Hirata, 2015;Lewis et al, 2017a, b;MacDonald, 1994;MartinOrdas et al, 2013;Mendes & Call, 2014;Menzel, 1999), to recognize people and places (Murai, Tanaka, Tomonaga, & Sakagami, 2011), and to retain knowledge over long periods of time (Beran, 2004;Beran & Heimbauer, 2015;Fagot & Cook, 2006;Laska, Alicke, & Hudson, 1996;Martin-Ordas et al, 2013;Vale et al, 2016).…”

Language and imagination: Evolutionary explorations

“…However, in lab conditions they have also been observed to extend a stick by putting another stick in a hole within the former. (See, for instance,Matsuzawa, 1994, andVale et al, 2016). This is still compatible with an interpretation as using two tools in tandem.…”

“…Clearly this would need further investigation, for instance by creating situations where tools are hard to come by, as in an experiment with orangutans in captivity (Mulcahy and Call, 2006), which suggests that this may indeed be a factor. (See Vale et al, 2016, for an interesting overview of varying performances in long-term memory, specifically involving procedural memory.) If the difference between food source retrieval and used tool retrieval is only relative, it may tell us that memory resources are a scarce commodity, with no room for 'trivia'.…”