Julia Cissewski

Julia Cissewski gained a Diploma degree in Romance and English studies and Economics for higher education and a Ph.D. in Psychology from the University of Leipzig. Since 1998 she has been working as assistant to the director and department administrator at MPI-EVA. Her responsibilities include budgetary and personnel matters and managing the guest program. Her own research is in the areas of animal cognition and language evolution.

Animal cognition and social behaviour, language evolution.

Gesellschaft für Primatologie 
International Society for Gesture Studies 
Primate Society of Great Britain

Orang-Utans in Not e.V. (president) 
Wild Chimpanzee Foundation – Germany e.V.

Universitätsgesellschaft Freunde und Förderer der Universität Leipzig e.V.
Leipzig Alumni

Cissewski, Julia and Lydia Luncz (2021): Symbolic Signal Use in Wild Chimpanzee Gestural Communication?: A Theoretical Framework. Front. Psychol. 12:718414. DOI: 10.3389/fpsyg.2021.718414

Cissewski, Julia, Lydia Luncz and Christophe Boesch: Ground-nest building in wild chimpanzees in Taї National Park: non-social behavior and group-specific gesture. Poster presented at the Winter Meeting of the Primate Society of Great Britain (PSGB), London, November 28 - 29, 2017.

Cissewski, Julia (2017): 3 1/2 Fragen an ... Die Zeit, CHANCEN Brief, 7 September 2017. PDF

Cissewski, Julia (2017): Die Orang-Utans retten – und uns selbst. fairquer. Sächsische entwicklungspolitische Zeitschrift (39), 29 - 30.

Cissewski, Julia and Christophe Boesch (2016): Communication without language: How great apes may cover crucial advantages of language without creating a system of symbolic communication. Gesture 15(2), 224-249, DOI: 10.1075/gest.15.2.04cis

Cissewski, Julia and Christophe Boesch: Population-specific semantic shifts: A case of social learning in wild chimpanzee populations? Poster presented at the Winter Meeting of the Association for the Study of Animal Behavior (ASAB), London, December 3 - 4, 2015.

Cissewski, Julia and Christophe Boesch: The role of 'natural meaning' in great ape communication. Poster presented at the Spring Meetingof the Primate Society of Great Britain (PSGB), Roehampton, London, April 9 - 10, 2015.

Cissewski, Julia and Christophe Boesch: How great apes can do without language. Poster presented at the Fourteenth Conference of the Gesellschaft für Primatologie (GfP), Leipzig, February 11 - 13, 2015.

Herrmann, Esther, Brian Hare, Julia Cissewski and Michael Tomasello (2011): A comparison of temperament in nonhuman apes and human infants. Developmental Science 14(6), 1393–1405, DOI: 10.1111/j.1467-7687.2011.01082.x

Herrmann, Esther, Brian Hare, Julia Cissewski and Michael Tomasello: The origin of human temperament: Differences in the response to novelty among great apes and human children. Poster presented at the SRCD Biennial Meeting, Denver, CO, April 2-4, 2009.

Cissewski, Julia and Biruté M. Galdikas: Gestural communication in wild orangutans (Pongo pygmaeus) of Tanjung Puting National Park, Indonesia – an ongoing study. Poster presented at the Fifth International Conference on the Evolution of Language, Leipzig, March 31 - April 3, 2004.

Cissewski, Julia: What's the point? Pointing from a comparative perspective. Talk presented at the Anlang meeting, Leipzig, January 28, 2003.