The Chimp That Says Just What She Thinks

She looks and behaves like any other chimp – in every respect except for one: 14-yearold Panbanisha has the language skills of a four-year-old child. According to her keepers, she has a vocabulary of 3,000 English words, understands complex sentences, and speaks through a computer voice synthesizer. If she is hungry, she will ask, ‘Please buy me a burger.’ If she is enjoying a hot drink, she will inform her guests: ‘Good coffee’

And she has a grasp of abstract ideas which were previously thought too complex for a chimp’s brain. Once they asked her what was wrong, after thinking for a while she stood up and replied, ‘I’m thinking about eating something’.

The chimp was born at Georgia State University in Atlanta and has been surrounded by the people there all her life. Duane Rumbaugh, professor of biology and psychology, said, ‘This is exciting research. Panbanisha can understand spoken words and give appropriate replies. It shows language skills are not confined to humans and implies that chimps have the power of thought and reasoning’. 

Adapted from the Highbeam website