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Wild-captive contrasts in non-vocal communicative repertoires and functional specificity in orang-utans

View ORCID ProfileMarlen Fröhlich, Natasha Bartolotta, Caroline Fryns, Colin Wagner, Laurene Momon, Marvin Jaffrezic, Tatang Mitra Setia, Caroline Schuppli, Maria van Noordwijk, Carel P. van Schaik
doi: https://doi.org/10.1101/2021.01.19.426493
Marlen Fröhlich
1Department of Anthropology, University of Zurich, Zurich, Switzerland
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  • For correspondence: marlen.froehlich@uzh.ch
Natasha Bartolotta
1Department of Anthropology, University of Zurich, Zurich, Switzerland
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Caroline Fryns
1Department of Anthropology, University of Zurich, Zurich, Switzerland
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Colin Wagner
2DEPE-IPHC – Département Ecologie, Physiologie et Ethologie, University of Strasbourg, Strasbourg, France
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Laurene Momon
2DEPE-IPHC – Département Ecologie, Physiologie et Ethologie, University of Strasbourg, Strasbourg, France
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Marvin Jaffrezic
2DEPE-IPHC – Département Ecologie, Physiologie et Ethologie, University of Strasbourg, Strasbourg, France
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Tatang Mitra Setia
3Fakultas Biologi, Universitas Nasional, Jakarta Selatan, Indonesia
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Caroline Schuppli
1Department of Anthropology, University of Zurich, Zurich, Switzerland
4Leipzig Center for Early Child Development, Leipzig, Germany
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Maria van Noordwijk
1Department of Anthropology, University of Zurich, Zurich, Switzerland
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Carel P. van Schaik
1Department of Anthropology, University of Zurich, Zurich, Switzerland
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Abstract

The creation of novel communicative acts is an essential element of human language. Although some research suggests the presence of this ability in great apes, this claim remains controversial. Here, we use orang-utans (Pongo spp.) to systematically assess the effect of the wild-captive contrast on the repertoire size of communicative acts. We find that individual communicative repertoires are significantly larger in captive compared to wild settings, irrespective of species, age-sex class or sampling effort. Twenty percent of the orang-utan repertoire in captivity were not observed in the wild. In Sumatran orang-utans, the more sociable species, functional specificity was also higher in captive versus wild settings. We thus conclude that orang-utans, when exposed to a more sociable and terrestrial lifestyle, have the behavioural plasticity to invent new communicative behaviours that are highly functionally specific. This productive capacity by great apes is a major prerequisite for the evolution of language and seems to be ancestral in the hominid lineage.

Competing Interest Statement

The authors have declared no competing interest.

Footnotes

  • https://github.com/MarlenF/repertoire-orang

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The copyright holder for this preprint is the author/funder, who has granted bioRxiv a license to display the preprint in perpetuity. All rights reserved. No reuse allowed without permission.
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Posted January 20, 2021.
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Wild-captive contrasts in non-vocal communicative repertoires and functional specificity in orang-utans
Marlen Fröhlich, Natasha Bartolotta, Caroline Fryns, Colin Wagner, Laurene Momon, Marvin Jaffrezic, Tatang Mitra Setia, Caroline Schuppli, Maria van Noordwijk, Carel P. van Schaik
bioRxiv 2021.01.19.426493; doi: https://doi.org/10.1101/2021.01.19.426493
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Wild-captive contrasts in non-vocal communicative repertoires and functional specificity in orang-utans
Marlen Fröhlich, Natasha Bartolotta, Caroline Fryns, Colin Wagner, Laurene Momon, Marvin Jaffrezic, Tatang Mitra Setia, Caroline Schuppli, Maria van Noordwijk, Carel P. van Schaik
bioRxiv 2021.01.19.426493; doi: https://doi.org/10.1101/2021.01.19.426493

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