Klaus Zuberbühler
Klaus Zuberbühler is Full Professor at the University of Neuchâtel and head of the Head Comparative Cognition Laboratory, University of Neuchâtel, Switzerland. Before coming to Neuchâtel he was Associate Professor at Saint-Andrews University and a Fellow of the Institute for Advanced Study in Berlin, Germany.
Dr. Zuberbühler works on the evolution of intelligence and origins of language. His research focuses on the mental mechanisms underlying non-human primate communication and behaviour both in the field and in the lab. Dr. Zuberbühler’s award-winning work on the communication and cognition of non-human primates in their natural habitats in Africa, South America and Asia has had a considerable impact on our understanding of primate cognition and, more generally, what it means to be human. His research revealed many parallels to the deep and surface structure of human communication, showing how key properties of human language have their evolutionary roots in the primate lineage. Dr. Zuberbühler’s current research examines how our closest living relatives, the chimpanzees and bonobos, use their natural communication signals to convey meaning and how this behavior is guided by social awareness and intention.
During his visit to Strasbourg, further steps towards building a Swiss-Fench collaboration on primate behaviour will be taken, including students’ exchanges and joint field projects. In addition, dr. Zuberbühler will give a plenary talk at the opening of the Annual Congress of the French Society for the Study of Animal Behavior which will take place on 21-13 April 2015.