(Our happy hour fact to amaze your drinking buddies with.)

When mothered by humans, baby chimpanzees are more cognitively advanced than the average toddler.

A group of orphaned chimps raised like human children scored about 10 percent better than their less hirsute counterparts on a test of standard intellectual development at nine months. Conversely, orphaned chimps reared with only their physical needs taken care of scored about 10 percent lower.

Regardless of how they are brought up, infant chimps will eventually fall behind humans in developmental terms. Scientists believe this study proves the importance of providing emotionally based care to humans (and great apes) during their first year.

Unfortunately, this study also suggests that once the robots link up with our sneakily smart chimp cousins, the human race will be doomed to spend eternity slaving in the spice mines.

Click here to have Happy Hour Hero delivered to your desktop every pour time.

The new Happy Hour Hero widget brings amazing facts and figures to your desktop, MySpace page, Facebook profile, or blog:



loading...