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["Andrew Hund" <axh69 AT po.cwru.edu>]

 

http://www.enn.com/news/2004-01-28/s_12467.asp

Wednesday, January 28, 2004

Adapted by Kathleen M. Wong, California Academy of Sciences

 

The talent that gave humans alone mastery over language may have been identified. In a new study, psychologists Marc Hauser of Harvard University and W. Tecumseh Fitch of the University of St. Andrews, Scotland, compared the ability of monkeys and humans to recognize grammar rules.

The concept of word ordering — the idea that certain kinds of words must follow other types of words, as in the article-pair "a tree" — is a basic component of language. The scientists played recordings of one-syllable words spoken alternately by a man and a woman to both cotton-top tamarin monkeys and college students. The monkeys looked at the loudspeaker whenever the pattern varied, indicating they had noticed the change; the human subjects also picked up the pattern alterations. The scientists then played recordings of a man speaking one to three words, followed by a woman speaking the same number of words. The rule corresponds to the "if ... then ..." phrase structure of language.

All the human subjects correctly identified pattern changes, even though they were often unable to articulate the structure of the pattern itself. The monkeys, however, recognized none of the variations. The cognitive ability to spot recursive language patterns may have been what allowed humans to develop their linguistic genius, the researchers report in the journal Science.

 

Monkeys Illuminate Language Advance: Scientific American / New Scientist / MSNBC (Science)