Primatology, Ethics and Trauma: The Oklahoma Chimpanzee Studies

Summary

It has been fifty years since the first language experiments on chimpanzees. Robert Ingersoll is well known for being one of the main carers and best friend of the chimpanzee, Nim Chimpsky, but there were other chimpanzees in the University of Oklahoma's Institute for Primate Studies, including Washoe, Moja, Kelly, Booee, and Onan, who were taught sign language in the quest to discover whether language is learned or innate in humans. Antonina Anna Scarnà's expertise in language acquisition and neuroscience offers a vehicle for critical evaluation of those studies.

Ingersoll and Scarnà investigate how this research failed to address the emotional needs of the animals. It is time to consider the research from a different perspective, examining the neglect and cruelty that was inflicted on those animals in the name of psychological science. This book re-examines those cases, addressing directly the suffering and traumatic experiences endured by the captive chimpanzees, in particular the female chimpanzee, Washoe, and her resultant inability to be a competent mother.

This book discusses the unethical nature of the studies in the context of recent research on trauma and offers a specific and direct psychological message, proposing to finally close the door on the language side of these chimpanzee studies.