Progovac's study challenges two dominant narratives in human evolution: "survival of the fittest" (physical strength) and "survival of the friendliest" (prosociality). While both played a role, ...

A new study suggests that the fundamental abilities underlying human language and technological culture may have evolved before humans and apes diverged millions of years ago. A new study suggests ...

Language is one of the few faculties that still seems to be uniquely human. Other animals, like chimpanzees and songbirds, have developed elaborate communication systems, but none appears to convey ...

Wild chimpanzees alter the meaning of single calls when embedding them into diverse call combinations, mirroring linguistic operations in human language. Human language, however, allows an infinite ...

My son is a wizard. He walks into the kitchen, looks at me and utters the magic words: “Can I have a cheese and tomato sandwich, please?” A few minutes later, just such a snack appears in front of him ...

Why do humans have language and other animals apparently don't? It's one of the most enduring questions in the study of mind and communication. Across all cultures, humans use richly expressive ...