ABSTRACT
Whether animals can learn symbols, use them representationally and abstractly, and use them to solve problems remain questions of high interest. Research since the mid-1960s, but particularly during the 1980s, indicates that chimpanzees are capable of mastering and using symbols in ways that parallel human use of words (Savage-Rumbaugh, 1986, 1987; Savage-Rumbaugh, McDonald, Sevcik, Hopkins, & Rubert, 1986; Savage-Rumbaugh, Sevcik, Brakke, Rumbaugh, & Greenfield, 1990). In accordance with the comparative perspective, the bases for human cognitive competence appear to be shared in significant part with our nearest living relatives, the great apes, Pongidae (Rumbaugh, 1990b). Those findings are, in turn, part of a growing number of comparative psychological studies that document impressive cognitive operations of animals and birds in general (e.g., Roitblat, Bever, & Terrace, 1984).
