New research shows chimpanzees to use gestures to communicate with one another while pursing a specific goal.

According to a press release, researchers from Georgia State University (GSU) studied two language-trained chimps as they interacted with a human experimenter. Their task was devised for them to have to coordinate with each other to find a hidden piece of food.

Dr. Anna Roberts, of the University of Chester and study collaborator, said the findings could be an important part to learning more about the evolutionary past of language.

"The use of gestures to coordinate joint activities such as finding food may have been an important building block in the evolution of language," she said in the release.

For the study, published in the journal Nature Communications, the two chimps and human had to work with each other to find the hidden food in a large outdoor range. None of the three knew where the food was hidden.

"It allows the chimpanzees to communicate information in the manner of their choosing, but also requires them to initiate and to persist in communication," Dr. Charles Menzel, a senior research scientist at GSU's Language Research Center, said in the release. "The chimpanzees used gestures to recruit the assistance of an otherwise uninformed person and to direct the person to hidden objects 10 or more meters away. Because of the openness of this paradigm, the findings illustrate the high level of intentionality chimpanzees are capable of, including their use of directional gestures. This study adds to our understanding of how well chimpanzees can remember and communicate about their environment."

Also from the University of Chester, Dr. Sam Roberts connected the chimp's coordination with games children play.

"This flexible use of pointing, taking into account both the location of the food and the actions of the experimenter, has not been observed in chimpanzees before," Roberts said in the release.

A study collaborator, Dr. Sarah-Jane Vick, of the University of Stirling, said, "Previous findings in both wild and captive chimpanzees have indicated flexibility in their gestural production, but the more complex coordination task used here demonstrates the considerable cognitive abilities that underpin chimpanzee communication."