Adolfo Perinat Maceres, Agustí Dalmau
La presente investigación tiene como sujetos a dos pequeños gorilas criados artificialmente Entre ellos y sus cuidadoras se han creado episodios de juego manipulativo al efecto de que emergieran
Two infant gorillas raised by humans have been observed in controlled communicative episodes with their caretakers. Our aim was to facilitate the emergence of joint action formats which are typical patterns of behaviour in the interaction between human mothers and infants at the same developmental ages. In spite of their attachment and warm relationships with caretakers, the gorillas� responses have been very poor. On the other hand, in some specific situations gorillas showed their ability to understand �what happened� and also to make their plans understandable to the caretakers.
We undertook to analyse the scope of this capacity of �sharing meanings� between gorillas and humans. Since communicative actions come out in episodes in which either a consummatory drive or motor play was involved, we looked into the relationships between motivational systems and communicative action. We have set forth an interpretative framework to reveal the prerequisites of symbolic functioning and advanced communicative pattern, which are present in human infants but not in gorillas and possibly not in other anthropoids.