Savage-Rumbaugh

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What is displacement?
Ability to speak about present, past or future
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What is arbitrariness?
No natural connection between word/sound and the thing it denotes (as opposed to onomatopoeia)
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What does the study by Savage-Rumbaugh support, nature or nurture?
Nurture
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What were the names of the chimpanzees?
Pygmy: Kanzi (4 years old); Mulika (3 years old) Common: Austin (9 years old); Sherman (10 years old)
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Why were pygmy chimps not tested for language acquistion prior to the study?
They were seen as irrelevant to the understanding of the evolution of human language
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Why were pygmy chimps seen as more prepared to acquire language than other apes?
More developed in gestural, visual and vocal communications
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What was the aim of Savage-Rumbaugh's study?
To study the language acquisition of two pygmy chimps compared with two common chimps
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What was the secondary aim of Savage-Rumbaugh's study?
To describe the first instance in which a non-human has acquired symbols without specific training towards that goal
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What was the method of Savage-Rumbaugh's study?
Longitudinal observational case study; Quasi experiment
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What were the independant and dependant variables?
IV: Pygmy chimps; Common chimps DV: Ability to acquire language
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Differences between upbringings of chimps:
Pygmy chimps born in captivity in USA and reared in language-using environment with access to mother, Matata; Common chimps reared in language-using environment
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Similarities of rearing environments:
Attachments to care givers; Opportunity to observe/interact with people; Exposure to human speech/gestures; Exposure to photographs and novel objects; Formal testing
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Differences of rearing environments:
Common chimps given training, pygmy chimps learn via observation; Common chimps did not have speech synthesiser as they could not understand human speech; Common chimps did not have 'pointing board' outside laboratory
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What were the classifications of each utterance:
Correct; Incorrect; Spontaneous; Imitated; Structured
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How was reliability established?
Inter-rater reliability via a videotape (almost 100% agreement)
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What were some of the formal tests used?
Blind tests; matching words to lexigrams; matching pictures to lexigrams; at the end of the 17-months chimps were tested on all the items in their vocabulary
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How did the time it took chimps to acquire language differ?
Between 6 and 16 moths pygmy chimps spontaneously used gestures to communicate; Similar gestures were used by common chimps between 2 and 4 years
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Results:
Pygmy chimps did significantly better than common chimps in 'Match symbol to photo'; No significant difference in 'Match photo to symbol'; Pygmy chimps score 98% in 'Match symbol to English'; Kanzi scores 79% in 'Match symbol to speech synthesiser'
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Conclusions:
Pygmy chimps comprehended lexigrams and spoken English words with more ease; Pygmy chimps used lexigrams more specifically; Pygmy chimps were able to refer to requests involving others
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Savage-Rumbaugh's conclusions:
Pygmy chimps exhibit acquisiton skills distinctly different to that of common chimps; Suprising considering close relation; Findings minimise significance of behavioural differences between humans and apes; Highlights power of cultural learning
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Other cards in this set

Card 2

Front

What is arbitrariness?

Back

No natural connection between word/sound and the thing it denotes (as opposed to onomatopoeia)

Card 3

Front

What does the study by Savage-Rumbaugh support, nature or nurture?

Back

Preview of the front of card 3

Card 4

Front

What were the names of the chimpanzees?

Back

Preview of the front of card 4

Card 5

Front

Why were pygmy chimps not tested for language acquistion prior to the study?

Back

Preview of the front of card 5
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