Experiments on the emergence of human communication
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Updated: Aug 7, 2026

The HoneyComb Paradigm for Research on Collective Human Behavior
Published on: January 19, 2019
1Vrije Universiteit Brussel, Pleinlaan 2, 1050 Brussels, Belgium; Sony CSL Paris, 6 rue Amyot, 75005 Paris, France. steels@arti.vub.ac.be
Abstract:
Children learn language from their parents and then use the acquired system throughout the rest of their life with little change. At least that is commonly assumed. But a recent paper by Galantucci adds to the growing evidence that adults (and children) are able to create and negotiate complex communication systems from scratch and relatively quickly, without a prior model. This raises questions of what cognitive mechanisms are implied in this joint construction of communication systems, and what the implications are for the origins of human language.
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