Currently browsing "Primates"
People Aren’t Born Afraid of Spiders and Snakes: Fear Is Quickly Learned During Infancy
There's a reason why Hollywood makes movies like Arachnophobia and Snakes on a Plane: Most people are afraid of spiders and snakes. A new paper published in Current Directions in Psychological Science, a journal of the Association for Psychological Science, reviews research with infants and toddlers and finds that we aren't born afraid of spiders and snakes, but we can learn these fears very quickly.... More>
Observation
Right-handed Chimpanzees Provide Clues to the Origin of Human Language
Most of the linguistic functions in humans are controlled by the left cerebral hemisphere. A study of captive chimpanzees at the Yerkes National Primate Research Center (Atlanta, Georgia), reported in the January 2010 issue of Elsevier’s Cortex (http://www.elsevier.com/locate/cortex), suggests that this “hemispheric lateralization” for language may have its evolutionary roots in the gestural communication of our common ancestors.... More>
