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Orangutans can predict future experiences

21-year-old orang-utan Naong in furuvik Zoo, which demonstrated that he can predict the taste sensations. Photographer: Tomas Persson
21-year-old orangutang Naong demonstrated that he can predict the taste sensations. Photographer: Tomas Persson

A new study from Lund University in Sweden shows that orangutans can imagine whether or not a certain juice blend is good or not, based on its ingredients. Predicting an experience of something that has not yet occurred can be done by using so-called affective forecasting – an ability that was previously considered unique to humans.

We use affective forecasting constantly in our daily lives. With it, we can imagine our future experiences in upcoming scenarios. Such feelings – triggered by simulating the future before our inner senses – guide our decisions on everything from how much we sweeten our lemonade to how we invest in the stock market.

“Often when making decisions, we envision what we will feel in the future, which makes many decisions more effective. And now, we have been able to show that monkeys probably do so too”, says Mathias Osvath, associate professor of cognitive zoology and initiator of the study.

To find out whether this ability only exists in human beings, the five cognitive researchers – with Gabriela-Alina Sauciuc as the lead author of the study – developed a new non-linguistic method which they then tested on the 21-year-old orangutan Naong at the Lund University Primate Research Station in Furuvik. The test examined whether the orangutan could predict new flavour combinations based on various familiar types of juices.

Since humans are the only animals that have so far demonstrated they have this ability, the same experiment was conducted on 10 human subjects to compare with the orangutan’s results. First, the participants were asked to taste and recognise the four basic flavours included in the orangutan experiment: cherry, rhubarb, lemon and apple cider vinegar.

Then the ingredients were mixed in front of the test subject in various combinations never experienced before. The question was whether they would be able to figure out what flavours were good and select these over those that were less good. The results showed that orangutans, just like people, systematically based their choices on different “rules of taste” and not simply through trial and error. The results suggest that affective forecasting existed in the common ancestor of orangutans and humans about 16 million years ago.

The cognitive researchers were not surprised by the results, as it has already been shown that apes are capable of planning for the future; however, the researchers were very impressed with the orangutan’s speed.

“When we, for instance, changed the colour of the juices to demonstrate that the orangutan did not prefer a particular colour, it was very quick to learn”, says Mathias Osvath.

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- Ravens just as clever as chimps despite having mini brains
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