Humans are often thought to be the only animals capable of language. But it's difficult to prove a negative like this because we'll never definitively know the subjective interior monologues of other ...

Back in the 1970s, a chimpanzee named Nim Chimpsky took part in a Columbia University research study called "Project Nim." Project Nim was led by Herbert Terrace, a psychologist at Columbia who was ...

A chimpanzee whose ability to learn American Sign Language suggested but did not prove that the animal could engage in humanlike conversation died on Tuesday, The New York Times reported today. The ...

SPOKANE, Wash. Washoe, a female chimpanzee believed to be the first non-human to acquire human language, has died of natural causes at the research institute where she was kept. Washoe, who first ...

Tired of ads? Subscribers enjoy a distraction-free reading experience. Click here to subscribe today or Login. Washoe, who had a vocabulary of 250 words, dies in Washington at age 72. Washoe is shown ...

She spent her early years playing in the backyard of a small house in Reno, Nev., learning American Sign Language from the scientists who adopted her. By age 5, she had mastered enough signs to ...

Humans are known to invent private hand gestures. Chimps in the wild do, too, a new study suggests. By Brandon Keim Parents and their children, or people who know each other well, often share some ...