Move aside, Vito Corleone and Sophia Loren! It's not just Italians who gesture with their hands - chimpanzees do too, study finds

From Vito Corleone in The Godfather to Sophia Loren in Yesterday, Today and Tomorrow, Italian characters are known to use over-the-top hand gestures. 

Now it turns out our closest living relative, chimpanzees, does too.

Researchers have discovered the primates gesture back and forth quickly like in human conversations.

A team from the University of St Andrews in Scotland collected data on more than 8,500 gestures for 252 chimpanzees living across five wild communities in East Africa.

They measured the timing of turn-taking and conversational patterns between individuals, who communicate through gestures rather than through speech.

Analysis revealed that most 'conversations' included a two-part exchange between two individuals, but some included up to seven parts.

Examples included the chimpanzees exchanging gestures after a conflict, with one reaching out to the other and having their hand tapped in response.

In another recorded interaction, chimpanzees exchanged reassuring gestures as they travelled in a large group.

Individuals greeted each other with grunts, while certain individuals embraced each other and exchanged open-mouth 'kisses'.

'While human languages are incredibly diverse, a hallmark we all share is that our conversations are structured with fast-paced turns of just 200 milliseconds on average', Professor Catherine Hobaiter, one of the study's authors, said.

'But it was an open question whether this was uniquely human, or if other animals share this structure. '

Overall, their chimpanzee data revealed a similar timing to human conversation, with short pauses between a gesture and a response of about 120 milliseconds.

'We found that the timing of chimpanzee gesture and human conversational turn-taking is similar and very fast, which suggests that similar evolutionary mechanisms are driving these social, communicative interactions, first author Dr Gal Badihi said.

'We did see a little variation among different chimp communities, which again matches what we see in people where there are slight cultural variations in conversation pace – come cultures have slower or faster talkers.'

The team said that in humans, it is the Danish who are 'slower' speakers. Meanwhile in Eastern chimpanzees, the equivalent is the Sonso community in Uganda.

They added that their findings, published in the journal Current Biology, suggest that human communication may not be as unique as previously thought.

'It shows that other social species don't need language to engage in close-range communicative exchanges with quick response time,' Dr Badihi said.

'Human conversations may share similar evolutionary history or trajectories to the communication system of other species, suggesting that this type of communication is not unique to humans but more widespread in social animals.'

In future studies the team said they want to explore why chimpanzees have these conversations to begin with – and they believe chimpanzees often rely on gestures to ask something of one-another.