Gorillas invented a new way to call people (BINTEO)  

To attract their attention

A surprising discovery was made at Zoo Atlanta in the US, after gorilla keepers videotaped a new interaction with these primates. Specifically, gorillas are using a new cry for the first time to call their caregivers. As you’ll see in the video below, 24-year-old Sukari calls her caregiver using what sounds like a sneeze/cough that the researchers called “snough” from the English words sneeze and cough.

Only two other species have been shown to create new zoo attention calls, chimpanzees and orangutans.

Gorilla communication with humans has been known since the 80s, when Koko learned and used sign language after years of training. However, the current evolution is something that the gorillas developed on their own.

To verify that “snough” is indeed a call to the caretaker, a series of tests was carried out, placing eight of the zoo’s gorillas in three different situations. In one only the caregiver was present, in the second there was only food and in the third the caregiver held the food. Both the food and the caregiver were in the gorilla’s field of vision, but away from him.

So it was found that the gorillas used “snough” in the third case, as if calling the caretaker to feed them. The same call was then traced to another 33 gorillas from 11 different zoos in the US and Canada.

The researchers aren’t sure if each gorilla individually figured out that this sound is effective in calling to humans or, as intelligent primates, they passed this knowledge on to each other.

Evidence of vocal learning and innovation is increasingly being found in captive monkeys. Orangutans can produce guttural sounds or whistles, chimpanzees adopt new food cries through vocal interaction with other chimpanzees, and gorillas such as Koko can produce a limited number of new cries. The results of the study show that gorillas can change their calls to produce a new sound and confirm that they produce sounds and make movements intentionally to attract the attention of their caregiver.

The research was published in PLOS One .