Vocal learning in wild chimpanzees

The overall goal of the project is to investigate how our closest living relatives, the chimpanzees, acquire the ability to socially learn to communicate, by observing and interacting with others in the wild, a core component of the human language faculty. The first target is to study the full vocal repertoire and describe the acoustic variance across items, and then to look for signs of social learning within the different call types. The second approach is experimental and will target the question of how sound-meaning linkages are established in the wild. Attention to ontogenetic effects is fundamental. We will use novel infrared thermography to assess social learning, in addition to more traditional behavioural measures, such as gaze direction, locomotion and vocal behavioural responses.