Centre for Social Learning and Cognitive Evolution and Scottish Primate Research Group, School of Psychology, University of St Andrews, St Andrews, Fife KY16 9JP, UK.
Anim Cogn. 2011 Nov;14(6):827-38. doi: 10.1007/s10071-011-0416-3. Epub 2011 May 12.
Chimpanzees at Budongo, Uganda, regularly gesture in series, including 'bouts' of gesturing that include response waiting and 'sequences' of rapid-fire gesturing without pauses. We examined the distribution and correlates of 723 sequences and 504 bouts for clues to the function of multigesture series. Gesturing by older chimpanzees was more likely to be successful, but the success rate of any particular gesture did not vary with signaller age. Rather, older individuals were more likely to choose successful gestures, and these highly successful gestures were more often used singly. These patterns explain why bouts were recorded most in younger animals, whereas older chimpanzees relied more on single gestures: bouts are best interpreted as a consequence of persistence in the face of failure. When at least one gesture of a successful type occurred in a sequence, that sequence was more likely to be successful; overall, however, sequences were less successful than single gestures. We suggest that young chimpanzees use sequences as a 'fail-safe' strategy: because they have the innate potential to produce a large and redundant repertoire of gestures but lack knowledge of which of them would be most efficient. Using sequences increases the chance of giving one effective gesture and also allows users to learn the most effective types. As they do so, they need to use sequences less; sequences may remain important for subtle interpersonal adjustment, especially in play. This 'Repertoire Tuning' hypothesis explains a number of results previously reported from chimpanzee gesturing.
在乌干达布顿戈的黑猩猩经常连续做手势，包括包括等待回应的“回合”和没有停顿的快速连续手势“序列”。我们研究了 723 个序列和 504 个回合的分布和相关性，以寻找多手势系列功能的线索。年长的黑猩猩的手势更有可能成功，但任何特定手势的成功率都不会随着信号器年龄的变化而变化。相反，年长的个体更有可能选择成功的手势，而这些非常成功的手势往往是单独使用的。这些模式解释了为什么在年轻动物中记录到的回合最多，而年长的黑猩猩则更多地依赖于单个手势：回合最好被解释为面对失败时坚持的结果。当一个成功类型的至少一个手势出现在一个序列中时，该序列更有可能成功；然而，总的来说，序列不如单个手势成功。我们认为，年轻的黑猩猩将序列用作“故障安全”策略：因为它们具有产生大量冗余手势的内在潜力，但不知道哪种手势最有效。使用序列可以增加给出一个有效手势的机会，也允许用户学习最有效的类型。随着他们这样做，他们需要使用序列的次数减少；序列可能仍然对微妙的人际调整很重要，尤其是在游戏中。这种“曲目调整”假说解释了之前从黑猩猩手势中报告的许多结果。
