Humanness

Published: September 7, 2007, 8:30 am

Tags: sentience, apes, cognition, humans, evolution, primate, monkey, orangutan, animals

I would hope so.Human toddlers outperform apes in social learningOne theory holds that humans have distinctive "cultural intelligence," she said. Alternatively, some think humans hold an advantage in social cognitive tasks simply because they have more general intelligence.Human toddlers show markedly better social learning skills compared to their primate cousins, a new study finds."Social cognition skills are critical for learning," Herrmann said in a news release. "The children were much better than the apes in understanding nonverbal communications, imitating another's solution to a problem and understanding the intentions of others," she said. Hermann's study involved 230 subjects -- 100 chimps, 30 orangutans and 100 children. The children were two-and-a-half years old. That age was picked because the subjects could handle the test's tasks, but they were not old enough to know too much. The apes resided in sanctuaries in Africa and Indonesia. They ranged in age from three to 21

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