Baboons can 'recognise' four-letter words

Watch your language around baboons. They are more intelligent than you thought — in fact, the clever beasts can “recognise” four-letter words, says a study.

French researchers have found in their study that the monkeys can learn to distinguish between genuine English words and “nonsense” sequences of letters, a trait earlier assumed to be unique to humans, the ‘Daily Mail’ reported.

In fact, the researchers studied a group of six baboons housed in an enclosure that contained several booths holding computers with touch-sensitive screens.

The animals, which had free access to the booths, were presented with sequences of four letters, and by tapping one of two shapes on the screen, could signify if they were seeing a word or a non-word.

A correct response earned a food reward. Over a month and a half, the baboons learned to discriminate dozens of words from more than 7,000 non-words with almost 75 per cent accuracy. This ability to identify specific combinations of letters is called “orthographic processing” and is a key component of reading.

Dr Jonathan Grainger at Aix-Marseille University, who led the study, said: “Our study may help explain the success of the human cultural choice of visually representing words using combinations of aligned, spatially compact, ordered sequences of symbols.

“The primate brain might therefore be better prepared than previously thought to process printed words, hence facilitating the initial steps toward mastering one of the most complex of human skills — reading.”