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Updated: Jul 12, 2026

Behavioral Assessment of Manual Dexterity in Non-Human Primates
Published on: November 11, 2011
Conservation of liquid and solid quantity by the chimpanzee
Abstract:
Sarah, an adult "language"-trained chimpanzee, made accurate same-different judgments on quantities of liquid and solid matter and conserved both types of quantity despite a transformation in an irrelevant property (shape). Control tests showed that she judged on the basis of inference rather than perceptual evaluation of the quantities. She failed to make accurate same-different judgments on the basis of number, and she was not tested for conservation of this type of quantity.
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