Compared the abilities of 3 mother-reared and 3 human-raised (enculturated) chimpanzees and 16 human toddlers to imitatively learn novel actions on objects. Found that mother-reared chimpanzees were poorer imitators than both enculturated chimpanzees and human children, who did not differ from one another in imitative learning. On time delay…

Discusses how animals learn from companions, especially among Norway rats. Rats begin early eating foods that other rats eat. Adults also choose to eat a food largely because companions are eating it even if they had learned to avoid the food at an earlier time. Other animals also learn from watching companions' eating techniques, reactions to…

A human demonstrator showed human children and captive chimpanzees how to drag food or toys closer using a rakelike tool. One side of the rake was less efficient than the other for dragging. Chimps tried to reproduce results rather than methods while children imitated and used the more efficient rake side. Concludes that imitation leads to…