alt Hacker NewsI'm not entirely sold by this discovery. For example when you learn to train dogs, you learn about the 3 voices. Encouraging voice, atta boy, negative voice, more stern, and the big "NO!".
To some degree these words type sounding language are doing the same thing. Some sounds will irk, some will soothe, and it would affect this 'evidence' found.
I think the researchers agree with your premise. The “evidence” is not that chicks have more language understanding than previously understood, but rather that the source of the universality of bouba/kiki is due to something more primitive than built in human language hardware.