ArticleNature ecology & evolution2023
Great ape cognition is structured by stable cognitive abilities and predicted by developmental conditions.
Article in Nature ecology & evolution, 2023. The graph could read no effect estimate from its abstract, so it casts no vote on the map. Cited by 13 papers.
What it found
Each row is one number read from the abstract, on the scale the paper reported it, with its interval. Left of the dashed line favours the treatment, right favours the comparator. Under each row is the sentence it came from. New to these charts? A ten-minute tutorial.
The abstract states no effect estimate the extractor could read, or names no intervention and outcome on the map, so this paper lights no cell and moves no belief. It is still indexed, cited and linked below.
The trial behind it
Trials whose registry record cites this paper, or whose number appears in the abstract. A trial that started after this paper was published is citing it as background, not reporting it.
Neither the registry nor the abstract names a trial number. If this is a trial report, that itself is worth knowing.
Who cites it
13 citing papers in PubMed, 19 citations in OpenAlex.
- EVApeCognition: An 18-Year Dataset of Great Ape Cognition.Scientific data · 2026Article
- Inhibitory Control, Shifting, and Working Memory Updating Domains form Cognitive Phenotypes in Non-human Primates.bioRxiv : the preprint server for biology · 2026Article
- A panel of medaka isogenic lines suggests individual, seasonal, and sexual genetic variation ofFrontiers in behavioral neuroscience · 2026Article
- Brokering peace in the ape (culture) wars.Evolutionary human sciences · 2026Article
- Inhibitory control tests in non-human animals: validity, reliability, and perspectives.Biological reviews of the Cambridge Philosophical Society · 2025Review
- Sumatran orangutan mothers differ in the extent and trajectory of their expression of maternal behaviour.Proceedings. Biological sciences · 2025Article
- Wild and zoo-housed orangutans differ in how they explore objects.Scientific reports · 2025Article
- Reliable long-term individual variation in wild chimpanzee technological efficiency.Nature human behaviour · 2025Article
- Article
- Individual differences in sociocognitive traits in semi-free-ranging rhesus monkeys (Macaca mulatta).American journal of primatology · 2025Article
- A measure of reliability convergence to select and optimize cognitive tasks for individual differences research.Communications psychology · 2024Article
- Short-term memory, attentional control and brain size in primates.Royal Society open science · 2024Article
- The shifting shelf task: a new, non-verbal measure for attentional set shifting.Proceedings. Biological sciences · 2023Article
Corrections and comments
PubMed lists nothing against this paper. Absence here is not a guarantee, only a check that was made.
Authors and funding
6 authors at 2 institutions in 1 country.
Funding
No grant is acknowledged in the PubMed record.
Abstract
Great ape cognition is used as a reference point to specify the evolutionary origins of complex cognitive abilities, including in humans. This research often assumes that great ape cognition consists of cognitive abilities (traits) that account for stable differences between individuals, which change and develop in response to experience. Here, we test the validity of these assumptions by assessing repeatability of cognitive performance among captive great apes (Gorilla gorilla, Pongo abelii, Pan paniscus, Pan troglodytes) in five tasks covering a range of cognitive domains. We examine whether individual characteristics (age, group, test experience) or transient situational factors (life events, testing arrangements or sociality) influence cognitive performance. Our results show that task-level performance is generally stable over time; four of the five tasks were reliable measurement tools. Performance in the tasks was best explained by stable differences in cognitive abilities (traits) between individuals. Cognitive abilities were further correlated, suggesting shared cognitive processes. Finally, when predicting cognitive performance, we found stable individual characteristics to be more important than variables capturing transient experience. Taken together, this study shows that great ape cognition is structured by stable cognitive abilities that respond to different developmental conditions.
Indexed as
Identifiers
What Socratic holds
Registered trials
Read under generation 80e0d062 · epoch 390. Bibliography from PubMed, PubMed Central and OpenAlex; grants from NIH RePORTER; trial links from ClinicalTrials.gov; estimates, votes and beliefs from the Socratic graph.