Navigation auf zora.uzh.ch

Search ZORA

ZORA (Zurich Open Repository and Archive)

Songbirds are excellent auditory discriminators, irrespective of age and experience

Narula, G; Hahnloser, R H R (2021). Songbirds are excellent auditory discriminators, irrespective of age and experience. Animal Behaviour, 175:123-135.

Abstract

Human infants but not adults possess the ability to perceive differences between non-native language phoneme categories. The predominant explanation for this age-related decline in discriminative ability is the effect of statistical learning driven by sensory exposure: phoneme categories of the native language take precedence, have a higher frequency of occurrence and may encompass category distinctions in non-native languages. Alternatively, one could explain the decline through a reduction in discriminative abilities attributable to ageing. Thus, to what extent is auditory perception influenced either by experience or by age-related processes? Here, we attempted to answer this question, which cannot easily be disentangled in humans, in songbirds, which share many properties with humans: both learn the statistical distribution of sounds in their environment, both possess neural circuits to process vocalizations of their own species and plasticity in these circuits is subject to critical periods. To study the effects of experience and ageing, we trained zebra finches, Taeniopygia guttata, to discriminate short from long versions of a single zebra finch song syllable type. Birds in four groups distinguished by their age (old versus young) and level of auditory experience (with song experience versus completely isolated from song) could learn to discriminate arbitrarily fine differences between song syllables, although we found a trend that upholds the statistical learning hypothesis: birds with song experience performed better than birds with no experience. Furthermore, birds in all groups were able to generalize their learning to new stimuli of the same type, and they were able to rapidly adapt their learned discrimination boundaries. Finally, we found that songbirds could accurately discriminate randomly selected renditions of a stereotyped adult song syllable, revealing a flexible ability to discriminate conspecific vocalizations.

Additional indexing

Item Type:Journal Article, refereed, original work
Communities & Collections:07 Faculty of Science > Institute of Neuroinformatics
Special Collections > Centers of Competence > Center for the Interdisciplinary Study of Language Evolution
Dewey Decimal Classification:570 Life sciences; biology
Scopus Subject Areas:Life Sciences > Ecology, Evolution, Behavior and Systematics
Life Sciences > Animal Science and Zoology
Uncontrolled Keywords:Animal Science and Zoology, Ecology, Evolution, Behavior and Systematics
Language:English
Date:1 May 2021
Deposited On:28 Mar 2022 13:12
Last Modified:27 Oct 2024 02:40
Publisher:Elsevier
ISSN:0003-3472
OA Status:Hybrid
Free access at:Publisher DOI. An embargo period may apply.
Publisher DOI:https://doi.org/10.1016/j.anbehav.2021.02.018
Project Information:
  • Funder: European Research Council
  • Grant ID:
  • Project Title:
  • Funder: Swiss National Science Foundation
  • Grant ID:
  • Project Title:
Download PDF  'Songbirds are excellent auditory discriminators, irrespective of age and experience'.
Preview
  • Content: Published Version
  • Licence: Creative Commons: Attribution 4.0 International (CC BY 4.0)

Metadata Export

Statistics

Citations

Dimensions.ai Metrics
1 citation in Web of Science®
1 citation in Scopus®
Google Scholar™

Altmetrics

Downloads

13 downloads since deposited on 28 Mar 2022
4 downloads since 12 months
Detailed statistics

Authors, Affiliations, Collaborations

Similar Publications