Chimpanzees Case Study

Primatologists have been studying the communication and language capabilities of various primates, primarily with chimpanzees, for many years, and they have found that chimpanzees are more than capable to share their emotions with their fellow species. In the past, it was thought that humans were the only species able to express themselves and communicate their feelings and emotions through language, but now we know that could not be the case. Chimpanzees are the closest living relative to modern humans, having shared a common ancestor who was around four to eight million years ago.

These primates live in social communities of several dozen animals, and can accustom themselves to woodlands, grasslands, and African rain forests. While they mostly walk on all fours, also known as knuckle walking, they are able to stand and walk when needed. Moving swiftly through the trees branch to branch, they are very mobile. Chimpanzees, unlike many other animal species, are able to produce and use their own tools such as sticks and stones. The stones are used in order to crack open nuts, while the sticks can claim insects from inside trees or even dig out grubs out of logs. This kind of behavior was shocking to a lot of anthropologists and primatologists because now it was clear that a lot of the behaviors that the chimpanzees were doing were learned through the socializing done by the older members of the chimpanzee community.

The social systems that chimpanzees are a part of really shape the species as a whole because they are such social primates. Chimpanzees are part of a fission-fusion social group that is essentially a large community that encompasses all of the individuals that are regularly associating with one another, a...

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...with something socially acceptable with a “pant-hoot.” Showing that a submissive individual was drawing attention of dominance over others with more power in the community or party would be done with a “pant-grunt.” There are distance calls in order to point out potential food sources for the rest of the group or to warn the group about other chimpanzees from another area. The “pant-hoot” starts off quietly and gradually becomes louder until it is similar to a scream or screech, and then it dies off again getting softer (Lang). The vocal skills of the chimpanzee are incredible, in that they are extremely precise and help to communicate between the community members for their safety in general. Because chimps are so similar to humans, it’s fascinating to study their culture and societal links to better understand what their visual and vocal capabilities include.