Word: povinelli
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Dates: during 1993-1993
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Psychologist Daniel Povinelli at the University of Southwestern Louisiana has conducted a number of experiments that adapt Premack's test for primates. In one version, chimpanzees had to choose which of two humans would be better at helping them find some hidden food. While the animals themselves could not see where the food was being hidden, they could observe that only one of the two humans had a full view of the process. When asked to choose a helper, the chimps overwhelmingly chose the human who knew where the food was hidden...
Just as four-year-olds have an insight that three-year-olds lack, chimps have an advantage over lesser primates. When Povinelli tried his experiment with rhesus macaques, the monkeys proved unable to distinguish between the human who knew where the food was and the one who didn't -- even after 600 attempts...
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