One of the most important features of how we communicate is not unique to us.
It likely existed in primates millions of years before human language evolved.
In the sentence “the dog that bit the cat ran away”, we know that the dog ran away, not the cat, even though there are other words between cat and dog.
This is non-adjacent dependency - our ability to understand how words relate to one another in a sentence.
Using an invented language based on sound rather than words, researchers found that marmosets and chimpanzees can identify non-adjacent dependencies.
These are our ancestors, evolving as far back as 40 million years ago.
Their ability to communicate at such a high level likely existed back then, long before humans evolved.
Language is one the most powerful tools shaping us.
Knowing how it evolves helps us understand our existence and our history.
Original article:
Cognitive Elements of Language Have Existed for 40 Million Years
Original study:
Non-adjacent dependency processing in monkeys, apes and humans