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Are gender roles in-born, or are they imprinted upon us? Science blogger Paul F. Norris went searching for answers in the scientific literature and came up with two incredible studies... one on rhesus monkeys, and the other on chimpanzees. What he discovered sheds some thought-provoking light on the nature/nurture debate over gender identity. More »
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Be honest. When you rolled out of bed this morning, who among you thought they'd be reading about the neuroanotomical correlates of poo-flinging in chimps today? In a study published in the latest issue of Philosophical Transactions of the Royal Society B, psychobiologist Bill Hopkins and his colleagues report that poo-flinging (and any-other-object-flinging) is, in fact, a sign of high-order brain development. The researchers report that chimps who threw more and with greater accuracy had more developed motor cortices and significantly better communication abilities than inaccurate, non-flingers. More »
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The battle over the future of chimpanzees in research has reached a critical point. Chimps are humans' closest extant relatives — and as such, they are arguably one of the best animal models available for biomedical investigations that have the potential to save countless human lives. More »
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Is selfless behavior in humans a unique evolutionary development? For years, studies designed to test prosociality, or altruism, in chimpanzees have presented them as "reluctant altruists" that are indifferent to the welfare of their fellow chimps. But now it seems that chimps care more for their fellow apes than we realized. More »
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Researchers recently discovered that chimps have over twice the number of sign language-like gestures than previously thought. Through painstaking effort, the researchers learned to decode which gestures meant, "I like your face," versus "I'm going to claw your face off." More »
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Humans may not be as chimp-like as you think. There could be a much more peaceable ape relative who is closer to us. I speak, of course, of the matriarchal, bisexual, polyamorous bonobo. More »
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In many cultures, girls play with dolls more often than boys do. Now chimps have been observed treating sticks like dolls. Is there a gender imbalance in the way chimps play with their dolls, too? More »
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Chimps may be one of our closest relatives, but they've shown a remarkably different approach altruism: They'll lend each other a hand, but need to be asked. More »
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Well, maybe not everything, but new research suggests that we're not as closely related to apes as you may have thought. The giveaway? The way we climb trees, apparently. More »
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