Well, there is a study finally that takes the cake for me . . . . 5 year old chimps outperformed adults and college students in a game of memory. You can check out the original article on the CNN website - as I reveal which news I find most interesting and relevant to my day! Basically, it seems as though they taught the chimps numbers, and flashed them on the screen. When the participants (human and ape alike) touched the screen, the numbers disappeared and were replaced by white squares. The trick then was to touch the squares that represented the numbers, in the order they appeared. Now first of all, this sounds confusing! Is this like the test where you read words in color, such as “red” which is in blue ink and eventually you start calling out the actual color instead of the word (ie you say “blue” when the written word is red, but the font is in blue)? I cry unfair advantage if this is the case, since really those chimps wouldn’t likely get confused in such a way - they have no association between the number “one” and that being the first number. Our minds our programmed to trick us from toddlerhood when we learn to count - we might automatically go for the square that was the number “two” second because we associate that as the next number. Foul I say!

But that confusion aside and even more of a driving force in my opinion - just how do they train these chimps to perform these tests? You got it - rewards! It’s no wonder the chimps were faster and more accurate, the sooner they completed the puzzle correctly, they probably got a little chimp-y treat. If I were going to be offered breakfast in bed (heck, I’ll even take a chocolate bar) to cream a chimp in a game of memory, those monkeys would go down. Anyway, my three year old outwits me on a daily basis (and I’m not just talking Memory), so really I’m used to the err…humiliation(?) and therefore that is no incentive. Positive reinforcement people!

Isn’t it interesting what scientists will spend their precious time and money on? Especially when we parents live it with our kids on a daily basis. Ask any parent and they’d have probably bet on the chimps too.

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I’m not really sure why I’m so indignant about this study - animal behaviour is usually very interesting for me, the geeky scientist. I guess it just struck my overtired, under caffeinated fancy this morning. My apologies in advance to the horde of animal behavorists that will soon be banging down my virtual door in righteous anger.