Project description DEENESFRITPL Turn-taking in human and animal communication The evolution of language still remains a mystery. Recently, scholars suggested that turn-taking may bridge the gap between human and animal communication. However, lack of comparative data and methodological shortcomings hamper an in-depth understanding of similarities and differences in human and animal turn-taking. The EU-funded TURNTAKING project will investigate turn-taking production and comprehension in four primate model systems: human children, chimpanzees (one of humans' closest living relatives), geladas (an Old World monkey species) and common marmosets ( a New World monkey species). It will combine paradigms and measures from conversational analysis and primatology to test whether turn-taking is uniquely human, evolved independently, or represents an ancient mechanism in the primate lineage. Show the project objective Hide the project objective Objective Language — the most distinctive human trait — remains a ‘mystery’1 or even a ‘problem’2 for evolutionary theory. It is underpinned by cooperative turn-taking3, which has been implicated with highly sophisticated cognitive skills such as mindreading4. Some have claimed that this turn-taking system is uniquely human5,6, but others argue that it provides the evolutionary ‘missing link’ between animal and human communication7. This debate has been constrained by a lack of comparative data, methodological confounds that often prevent meaningful comparisons, and a lack of information on key components of social relationships8,9 that might strongly impact upon turn-taking propensities. Objectives. TURNTAKING will quantify turn-taking production and comprehension in human children, chimpanzees, and two distantly related species — geladas and common marmosets. It will apply a powerful combination of systematic behavioral observations, eye-tracking paradigms, and established measures from Conversational Analysis3,10 and Primatology9 that allow the same type of data to be collected and analyzed in directly comparable ways across species. This will provide the first rigorous test of whether cooperative turn-taking is uniquely human, ancestral in the primate lineage, or evolved independently in different species. TURNTAKING will identify which hallmarks of human turn-taking are shared across different primate species, and which key components of relationship quality8,9 act upon turn-taking skills. Outcomes. This project will found the field of comparative turn-taking, and provide pioneering insights into the behavioral flexibility underlying different turn-taking systems. It will go beyond the state of the art by exposing whether cooperative turn-taking is the evolutionary ‘missing link’ between our species and our inarticulate primate cousins, and whether pro-social behaviors drove its emergence. Fields of science natural sciencesbiological scienceszoologymammalogyprimatology Programme(s) H2020-EU.1.1. - EXCELLENT SCIENCE - European Research Council (ERC) Main Programme Topic(s) ERC-2017-COG - ERC Consolidator Grant Call for proposal ERC-2017-COG See other projects for this call Funding Scheme ERC-COG - Consolidator Grant Coordinator UNIVERSITAET OSNABRUECK Net EU contribution € 1 999 795,00 Address Neuer graben/schloss 29 49074 Osnabrueck Germany See on map Region Niedersachsen Weser-Ems Osnabrück, Kreisfreie Stadt Activity type Higher or Secondary Education Establishments Links Contact the organisation Opens in new window Website Opens in new window Participation in EU R&I programmes Opens in new window HORIZON collaboration network Opens in new window Other funding € 0,00 Beneficiaries (1) Sort alphabetically Sort by Net EU contribution Expand all Collapse all UNIVERSITAET OSNABRUECK Germany Net EU contribution € 1 999 795,00 Address Neuer graben/schloss 29 49074 Osnabrueck See on map Region Niedersachsen Weser-Ems Osnabrück, Kreisfreie Stadt Activity type Higher or Secondary Education Establishments Links Contact the organisation Opens in new window Website Opens in new window Participation in EU R&I programmes Opens in new window HORIZON collaboration network Opens in new window Other funding € 0,00
