Gestural Origins: Linguistic Features of pan-African Ape Communication

Social and individual factors mediate chimpanzee vocal ontogeny

Author(s): Adrian Soldati, Pawel Fedurek, Guillaume Dezecache, Geresomu Muhumuza, Catherine Hobaiter, Klaus Zuberbühler, Josep Call
Published in: Scientific Reports, Issue 15, 2025, ISSN 2045-2322
Publisher: Nature Publishing Group
DOI: 10.1038/s41598-025-93207-x

News and Perspectives: Words matter in primatology

Author(s): Michelle Bezanson, Liliana Cortés-Ortiz, Júlio César Bicca-Marques, Ramesh Boonratana, Susana Carvalho, Marina Cords, Stella de la Torre, Catherine Hobaiter, Tatyana Humle, Patrícia Izar, Jessica W. Lynch, Tetsuro Matsuzawa, Joanna M. Setchell, Gladys Kalema Zikusoka, Karen B. Strier
Published in: Primates, Issue 65, 2024, Page(s) 33-39, ISSN 0032-8332
Publisher: Springer Verlag
DOI: 10.1007/s10329-023-01104-6

Object use in communication of semi-wild chimpanzees

Author(s): Violet Gibson, Sarah T. Boysen, Catherine Hobaiter, Marina Davila-Ross
Published in: Animal Cognition, Issue 26, 2023, Page(s) 1521-1537, ISSN 1435-9448
Publisher: Springer Verlag
DOI: 10.1007/s10071-023-01792-z

In search of animal normativity: a framework for studying social norms in non‐human animals

Author(s): Evan Westra, Simon Fitzpatrick, Sarah F. Brosnan, Thibaud Gruber, Catherine Hobaiter, Lydia M. Hopper, Daniel Kelly, Christopher Krupenye, Lydia V. Luncz, Jordan Theriault, Kristin Andrews
Published in: Biological Reviews, Issue 99, 2024, Page(s) 1058-1074, ISSN 1464-7931
Publisher: Cambridge University Press
DOI: 10.1111/brv.13056

Recognition of visual kinship signals in chimpanzees (Pan troglodytes) by humans (Homo sapiens).

Author(s): Hella Péter, Marion Laporte, Nicholas E. Newton-Fisher, Vernon Reynolds, Liran Samuni, Adrian Soldati, Linda Vigilant, Jakob Villioth, Kirsty E. Graham, Klaus Zuberbühler, Catherine Hobaiter
Published in: Journal of Comparative Psychology, Issue 136, 2024, Page(s) 255-269, ISSN 0735-7036
Publisher: American Psychological Association
DOI: 10.1037/com0000327

Self-directed and prosocial wound care, snare removal, and hygiene behaviors amongst the Budongo chimpanzees

Author(s): Elodie Freymann, Catherine Hobaiter, Michael Alan Huffman, Harmonie Klein, Geresomu Muhumuza, Vernon Reynolds, Nora E. Slania, Adrian Soldati, Eguma Robert Yikii, Klaus Zuberbühler, Susana Carvalho
Published in: Frontiers in Ecology and Evolution, Issue 13, 2025, ISSN 2296-701X
Publisher: Frontiers Media SA
DOI: 10.3389/fevo.2025.1540922

Shared semantics: Exploring the interface between human and chimpanzee gestural communication

Author(s): Mathew Henderson, Patrick G. Grosz, Kirsty E. Graham, Catherine Hobaiter, Pritty Patel‐Grosz
Published in: Mind & Language, Issue 39, 2024, Page(s) 454-471, ISSN 0268-1064
Publisher: Blackwell Publishing Inc.
DOI: 10.1111/mila.12500

Investigating intentionality in elephant gestural communication

Author(s): Vesta Eleuteri, Lucy Bates, Yvonne Nyaradzo Masarira, Joshua M. Plotnik, Catherine Hobaiter, Angela S. Stoeger
Published in: Royal Society Open Science, Issue 12, 2025, ISSN 2054-5703
Publisher: The Royal Society
DOI: 10.1098/rsos.242203

Flexibility in the social structure of male chimpanzees (Pan troglodytes schweinfurthii) in the Budongo Forest, Uganda

Author(s): Gal Badihi, Kelsey Bodden, Klaus Zuberbühler, Liran Samuni, Catherine Hobaiter
Published in: Royal Society Open Science, 2023, ISSN 2054-5703
Publisher: the Royal Society
DOI: 10.1101/2021.12.11.472209

Chimpanzee gestural exchanges share temporal structure with human language

Author(s): Gal Badihi, Kirsty E. Graham, Charlotte Grund, Alexandra Safryghin, Adrian Soldati, Ed Donnellan, Chie Hashimoto, Joseph G. Mine, Alex K. Piel, Fiona Stewart, Katie E. Slocombe, Claudia Wilke, Simon W. Townsend, Klaus Zuberbühler, Chiara Zulberti, Catherine Hobaiter
Published in: Current Biology, Issue 34, 2025, Page(s) R673-R674, ISSN 0960-9822
Publisher: Cell Press
DOI: 10.1016/j.cub.2024.06.009

Flexible grouping patterns in a western and eastern chimpanzee community

Author(s): Kathelijne Koops, Walter Akankwasa, Henry Didier Camara, Maegan Fitzgerald, Alex Keir, Gnan Mamy, Tetsuro Matsuzawa, Hella Péter, Kizza Vicent, Klaus Zuberbühler, Catherine Hobaiter
Published in: American Journal of Primatology, Issue 86, 2025, ISSN 0275-2565
Publisher: John Wiley & Sons Inc.
DOI: 10.1002/ajp.23593

Old age variably impacts chimpanzee engagement and efficiency in stone tool use

Author(s): Elliot Howard-Spink, Tetsuro Matsuzawa, Susana Carvalho, Catherine Hobaiter, Katarina Almeida-Warren, Thibaud Gruber, Dora Biro
Published in: eLife, Issue 14, 2025, ISSN 2050-084X
Publisher: eLife Sciences Publications
DOI: 10.7554/elife.105411.3

Primate origins of discourse-managing gestures: the case of hand fling

Author(s): Pritty Patel-Grosz, Matthew Henderson, Patrick Georg Grosz, Kirsty Graham, Catherine Hobaiter
Published in: Linguistics Vanguard, Issue 9, 2024, Page(s) 63-72, ISSN 2199-174X
Publisher: Walter de Gruyter GmbH
DOI: 10.1515/lingvan-2022-0004

Ecological factors are likely drivers of eye shape and colour pattern variations across anthropoid primates

Author(s): Juan Olvido Perea-García, Kokulanantha Ramarajan, Mariska E. Kret, Catherine Hobaiter, Antónia Monteiro
Published in: Scientific Reports, Issue 12, 2023, ISSN 2045-2322
Publisher: Nature Publishing Group
DOI: 10.1038/s41598-022-20900-6

Concerted conservation actions to support chimpanzee cultures

Author(s): Erin G. Wessling, Andrew Whiten, Serge K. Soiret, Katy Scholfield, Liran Samuni, Christian Rutz, Ian Redmond, Lilian Pintea, Annette Lanjouw, Kathelijne Koops, Serge A. Kamgang, Ammie K. Kalan, Rachel Ashegbofe Ikemeh, Tatyana Humle, Catherine Hobaiter, Heidrun Frisch-Nwakanma, Elodie Freymann, Osiris Doumbe, Philippa Brakes, Ekwoge Abwe, Crickette Sanz
Published in: Philosophical Transactions of the Royal Society B: Biological Sciences, Issue 380, 2025, ISSN 0962-8436
Publisher: Royal Society of London
DOI: 10.1098/rstb.2024.0143

Are ape gestures like words? Outstanding issues in detecting similarities and differences between human language and ape gesture

Author(s): Catherine Hobaiter, Kirsty E. Graham, Richard W. Byrne
Published in: Philosophical Transactions of the Royal Society B: Biological Sciences, Issue 377, 2022, ISSN 0962-8436
Publisher: Royal Society of London
DOI: 10.1098/rstb.2021.0301

Many morphs: parsing gesture signals from the noise

Author(s): Alexander Mielke, Gal Badihi, Kirsty E. Graham, Charlotte Grund, Chie Hashimoto, Alex K. Piel, Alexandra Safryghin, Katie E. Slocombe, Fiona Stewart, Claudia Wilke, Klaus Zuberbühler, Catherine Hobaiter
Published in: Behaviour Research Methods, 2025, ISSN 1554-3528
Publisher: Springer
DOI: 10.1101/2023.08.07.551967

Sensitivity to the communicative partner's attentional state: A developmental study on mother–infant dyads in wild chimpanzees (Pan troglodytes schweinfurthii)

Author(s): Mawa Dafreville, Catherine Hobaiter, Michèle Guidetti, David Sillam‐Dussès, Marie Bourjade
Published in: American Journal of Primatology, Issue 83, 2023, ISSN 0275-2565
Publisher: John Wiley & Sons Inc.
DOI: 10.1002/ajp.23339

Multimodal communication and audience directedness in the greeting behaviour of semi-captive African savannah elephants

Author(s): Vesta Eleuteri, Lucy Bates, Jake Rendle-Worthington, Catherine Hobaiter, Angela Stoeger
Published in: Communications Biology, Issue 7, 2024, ISSN 2399-3642
Publisher: Springer Science and Business Media LLC
DOI: 10.1038/s42003-024-06133-5

Dead-infant carrying by chimpanzee mothers in the Budongo Forest

Author(s): Adrian Soldati, Pawel Fedurek, Catherine Crockford, Sam Adue, John Walter Akankwasa, Caroline Asiimwe, Jackson Asua, Gideon Atayo, Boscou Chandia, Elodie Freymann, Caroline Fryns, Geresomu Muhumuza, Derry Taylor, Klaus Zuberbühler, Catherine Hobaiter
Published in: Primates, Issue 63, 2023, Page(s) 497-508, ISSN 0032-8332
Publisher: Springer Verlag
DOI: 10.1007/s10329-022-00999-x

Maternal gregariousness and female audience effects mediate mother–infant proximity in wild chimpanzees

Author(s): Pawel Fedurek, Cédric Girard-Buttoz, Patrick J. Tkaczynski, Catherine Hobaiter, Klaus Zuberbühler, Roman M. Wittig, Catherine Crockford
Published in: Animal Behaviour, Issue 223, 2025, Page(s) 123156, ISSN 0003-3472
Publisher: Academic Press
DOI: 10.1016/j.anbehav.2025.123156

Chimpanzee drumming shows rhythmicity and subspecies variation

Author(s): Vesta Eleuteri, Jelle van der Werff, Wytse Wilhelm, Adrian Soldati, Catherine Crockford, Nisarg Desai, Pawel Fedurek, Maegan Fitzgerald, Kirsty E. Graham, Kathelijne Koops, Jill Pruetz, Liran Samuni, Katie Slocombe, Angela Stoeger, Michael L. Wilson, Roman M. Wittig, Klaus Zuberbühler, Henry D. Camara, Gnan Mamy, Andrea Ravignani, Catherine Hobaiter
Published in: Current Biology, Issue 35, 2025, Page(s) 2448-2456.e4, ISSN 0960-9822
Publisher: Cell Press
DOI: 10.1016/j.cub.2025.04.019

Habitual ground nesting in the Bugoma Forest chimpanzees (Pan troglodytes schweinfurthii), Uganda

Author(s): Catherine Hobaiter, Harmonie Klein, Thibaud Gruber
Published in: American Journal of Primatology, 2024, ISSN 1098-2345
Publisher: Wiley
DOI: 10.1101/2022.12.14.520400

GesturalOrigins: A bottom-up framework for establishing systematic gesture data across ape species

Author(s): Charlotte Grund, Gal Badihi, Kirsty E. Graham, Alexandra Safryghin, Catherine Hobaiter
Published in: Behavior Research Methods, Issue 56, 2024, Page(s) 986-1001, ISSN 1554-3528
Publisher: Springer Science and Business Media LLC
DOI: 10.3758/s13428-023-02082-9

<scp>DeepWild</scp>: Application of the pose estimation tool <scp>DeepLabCut</scp> for behaviour tracking in wild chimpanzees and bonobos

Author(s): Charlotte Wiltshire, James Lewis‐Cheetham, Viola Komedová, Tetsuro Matsuzawa, Kirsty E. Graham, Catherine Hobaiter
Published in: Journal of Animal Ecology, Issue 92, 2023, Page(s) 1560-1574, ISSN 0021-8790
Publisher: Blackwell Publishing Inc.
DOI: 10.1111/1365-2656.13932

Connecting primate gesture to the evolutionary roots of language: A systematic review

Author(s): Evelina D. Rodrigues, António J. Santos, Flávia Veppo, Joana Pereira, Catherine Hobaiter
Published in: American Journal of Primatology, Issue 83, 2024, ISSN 0275-2565
Publisher: John Wiley & Sons Inc.
DOI: 10.1002/ajp.23313

A socio-ecological perspective on the gestural communication of great ape species, individuals, and social units

Author(s): Kirsty E. Graham, Gal Badihi, Alexandra Safryghin, Charlotte Grund, Catherine Hobaiter
Published in: Ethology Ecology & Evolution, Issue 34, 2023, Page(s) 235-259, ISSN 0394-9370
Publisher: Universita degli Studi di Firenze
DOI: 10.1080/03949370.2021.1988722

Chimpanzee lip-smacks confirm primate continuity for speech-rhythm evolution

Author(s): André S. Pereira, Eithne Kavanagh, Catherine Hobaiter, Katie E. Slocombe, Adriano R. Lameira
Published in: Biology Letters, Issue 16, 2021, Page(s) 20200232, ISSN 1744-9561
Publisher: The Royal Society
DOI: 10.1098/rsbl.2020.0232

Selectivity in Buttress Drumming Tree Properties Among Chimpanzees (Pan troglodytes schweinfurthii) of the Waibira Community in Budongo Forest, Uganda

Author(s): Wytse Wilhelm, Vesta Eleuteri, Kathelijne Koops, Maegan Fitzgerald, Klaus Zuberbühler, Catherine Hobaiter
Published in: American Journal of Primatology, Issue 87, 2025, ISSN 0275-2565
Publisher: John Wiley & Sons Inc.
DOI: 10.1002/ajp.23712

The form and function of chimpanzee buttress drumming

Author(s): Vesta Eleuteri, Matthew Henderson, Adrian Soldati, Gal Badihi, Klaus Zuberbühler, Catherine Hobaiter
Published in: Animal Behaviour, Issue 192, 2022, Page(s) 189-205, ISSN 0003-3472
Publisher: Academic Press
DOI: 10.1016/j.anbehav.2022.07.013

Scleral pigmentation leads to conspicuous, not cryptic, eye morphology in chimpanzees

Author(s): Juan Olvido Perea-García, Mariska E. Kret, Antónia Monteiro, Catherine Hobaiter
Published in: Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, Issue 116, 2022, Page(s) 19248-19250, ISSN 0027-8424
Publisher: National Academy of Sciences
DOI: 10.1073/pnas.1911410116

Referential gestures are not ubiquitous in wild chimpanzees: alternative functions for exaggerated loud scratch gestures

Author(s): C. Wilke, N.J. Lahiff, G. Badihi, E. Donnellan, C. Hobaiter, Z.P. Machanda, R. Mundry, S. Pika, A. Soldati, R.W. Wrangham, K. Zuberbűhler, K.E. Slocombe
Published in: Animal Behaviour, Issue 189, 2022, Page(s) 23-45, ISSN 0003-3472
Publisher: Academic Press
DOI: 10.1016/j.anbehav.2022.04.007

Well-digging in a community of forest-living wild East African chimpanzees (Pan troglodytes schweinfurthii)

Author(s): Hella Péter, Klaus Zuberbühler, Catherine Hobaiter
Published in: Primates, Issue 63, 2022, Page(s) 355-364, ISSN 0032-8332
Publisher: Springer Verlag
DOI: 10.1007/s10329-022-00992-4

Variable expression of linguistic laws in ape gesture: a case study from chimpanzee sexual solicitation

Author(s): Alexandra Safryghin, Catharine Cross, Brittany Fallon, Raphaela Heesen, Ramon Ferrer-i-Cancho, Catherine Hobaiter
Published in: Royal Society Open science, 2024, ISSN 2054-5703
Publisher: the Royal Society
DOI: 10.1101/2021.05.19.444810

Towards a great ape dictionary: Inexperienced humans understand common nonhuman ape gestures

Author(s): Kirsty E. Graham, Catherine Hobaiter
Published in: PLOS Biology, Issue 21, 2023, Page(s) e3001939, ISSN 1545-7885
Publisher: Public Library of Science (PLoS)
DOI: 10.1371/journal.pbio.3001939

The gestural repertoire of Bwindi mountain gorillas (Gorilla beringei beringei): gesture form and frequency of use

Author(s): Charlotte Grund, Martha M. Robbins, Catherine Hobaiter
Published in: Animal Cognition, Issue 28, 2025, ISSN 1435-9456
Publisher: Springer Science and Business Media LLC
DOI: 10.1007/s10071-025-01977-8

Thermal imaging reveals social monitoring during social feeding in wild chimpanzees

Author(s): Claire Barrault, Adrian Soldati, Catherine Hobaiter, Stephen Mugisha, Delphine De Moor, Klaus Zuberbühler, Guillaume Dezecache
Published in: Philosophical Transactions of the Royal Society B: Biological Sciences, Issue 377, 2023, ISSN 0962-8436
Publisher: Royal Society of London
DOI: 10.1098/rstb.2021.0302

Exploring greetings and leave-takings: communication during arrivals and departures by chimpanzees of the Bossou community, Guinea

Author(s): Evelina D. Rodrigues, António J. Santos, Misato Hayashi, Tetsuro Matsuzawa, Catherine Hobaiter
Published in: Primates, Issue 63, 2023, Page(s) 443-461, ISSN 0032-8332
Publisher: Springer Verlag
DOI: 10.1007/s10329-021-00957-z

Dialects in leaf-clipping and other leaf-modifying gestures between neighbouring communities of East African chimpanzees

Author(s): Gal Badihi, Kirsty E. Graham, Brittany Fallon, Alexandra Safryghin, Adrian Soldati, Klaus Zuberbühler, Catherine Hobaiter
Published in: Scientific Reports, Issue 13, 2023, ISSN 2045-2322
Publisher: Nature Publishing Group
DOI: 10.1038/s41598-022-25814-x

Understanding great ape calls and gestures with deep pretrained neural network

Author(s): Jiang Z, Soldati A, Hobaiter C, Moran S.
Published in: 2024
Publisher: Folia Primatologica

The use of pose-estimation and large language models in decoding great ape communication

Author(s): Catherine Hobaiter
Published in: AMERICAN JOURNAL OF BIOLOGICAL ANTHROPOLOGY, 2024
Publisher: Wiley

What can an AI-trained language software tell us about chimpanzee calls?

Author(s): Adrian Soldati, Josep Call, Klaus Zuberbuhler, Catherine Hobaiter
Published in: 2024
Publisher: Folia Primatologica

Compositionality of wild chimpanzee gestures

Author(s): Alexander Mielke, Gal Badihi, Kirsty Graham, Chie Hashimoto, Alex Piel, Alexandra Safryghin, Katie E Slocombe, Fiona Stewart, Claudia Wilke, Catherine Hobaiter
Published in: 2024
Publisher: Folia Primatologica

Recognizing Intentional Signals and their Meanings in Non-Human Communication

Author(s): Catherine Hobaiter, Adriano R. Lameira, Derek Ball
Published in: Xenolinguistics, 2023
Publisher: Routledge

Social Cognition and Communication in Chimpanzees and Bonobos

Author(s): Evelina Daniela Rodrigues & Catherine Hobaiter
Published in: Encyclopedia of Evolutionary Psychological Science, 2021
Publisher: Springer

Re-imagining great ape gesture (coding)

Author(s): Erica A Cartmill, Emilie Genty, Kirsty E Graham, Charlotte Grund, Catherine Hobaiter
Published in: The Oxford Handbook of Approaches to Language Evolution, 2025, Page(s) 469-486
Publisher: Oxford University Press

Gestural communication in the great apes: Tracing the origins of language

Author(s): Hobaiter, C
Published in: Chimpanzees in context: A comparative perspective on chimpanzee behavior, cognition, conservation, and welfare, 2020, Page(s) 233–259
Publisher: The University of Chicago Press

Eve of extinction

Author(s): Catherine Hobaiter, Nathaniel J. Dominy
Published in: Nature Ecology & Evolution, Issue 8, 2024, Page(s) 846-847, ISSN 2397-334X
Publisher: Springer Science and Business Media LLC
DOI: 10.1038/s41559-024-02359-y

Predictability of next elements in chimpanzee gesture sequences

Author(s): Alexander Mielke, Gal Badihi, Ed Donnellan, Kirsty E. Graham, Chie Hashimoto, Joseph G. Mine, Alex K. Piel, Alexandra Safryghin, Katie E. Slocombe, Adrian Soldati, Fiona A. Stewart, Simon W. Townsend, Claudia Wilke, Klaus Zuberbühler, Chiara Zulberti, Catherine Hobaiter
Published in: BioXiv, 2024, ISSN 2692-8205
Publisher: Cold Spring Harbour
DOI: 10.1101/2024.11.13.623362

The importance of local specialists in science: Where are the local researchers in primatology?

Author(s): Catherine Hobaiter, John Walter Akankwasa, Geresomu Muhumuza, Moreen Uwimbabazi, Inza Koné
Published in: Current Biology, Issue 31, 2023, Page(s) R1367-R1369, ISSN 0960-9822
Publisher: Cell Press
DOI: 10.1016/j.cub.2021.09.034

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