This next information is based on gathered information from Koko the gorilla's personal website and found that Project Koko has contributed to the study of the evolution and development of human communication. THe well-known gorilla, Koko, has been a case study of her intellectual, physical and linguistic development since her infancy. Koko, a female lowland gorilla born in 1971, uses American Sign Language and understands spoken English. Koko's participation in the study began when she was one year old. THe study is known as The Gorilla Language Project, which is both an effort to gather data about gorilla language and a case study of observed gorilla behavior and utterances. All signs, the context in which they occured, the number of repetitions, and anything unusual that might have occurred during signing are recorded daily. THe project administers informal and formal tests of vocabulary comprehension and of the understanding of relationships between objects and words, as well as standard child intelligence tests. During the course of the study, Koko has advanced further with language than any other non-himan. Koko has a working vocabulary of over 1,000 signs. Koko understands approximately 2,000 words of spoken English. Koko initiates the majority of conversations with her human companions and typically constructs statements averaging three to six words. Koko has a tested IQ of between 60 and 95 on a human scale, where 100 is considered "normal" (Koko's World 2000). In light of Koko's case, we have seen signs that indicate the language barrier between humans and animals possibly being broken. However, the majority of studies like that of Koko challenge whether human language is the final barrier separating us from animals. Evidence has shown that in most cases sentences always seem to be very short. Many times two or three gestures seem to be combined. But there are never connecting words that convey more sophi...
