Showing papers by "W. Tecumseh Fitch published in 2005"

Red deer stags use formants as assessment cues during intrasexual agonistic interactions.

Abstract: While vocal tract resonances or formants are key acoustic parameters that define differences between phonemes in human speech, little is known about their function in animal communication. Here, we used playback experiments to present red deer stags with re-synthesized vocalizations in which formant frequencies were systematically altered to simulate callers of different body sizes. In response to stimuli where lower formants indicated callers with longer vocal tracts, stags were more attentive, replied with more roars and extended their vocal tracts further in these replies. Our results indicate that mammals other than humans use formants in vital vocal exchanges and can adjust their own formant frequencies in relation to those that they hear.

The evolution of language: a comparative review

Abstract: For many years the evolution of language has been seen as a disreputable topic, mired in fanciful ''just so stories'' about language origins. However, in the last decade a new synthesis of modern linguistics, cognitive neuroscience and neo-Darwinian evolutionary theory has begun to make important contributions to our understanding of the biology and evolution of language. I review some of this recent progress, focusing on the value of the comparative method, which uses data from animal species to draw inferences about language evolution. Discussing speech first, I show how data concerning a wide variety of species, from monkeys to birds, can increase our understanding of the anatomical and neural mechanisms underlying human spoken language, and how bird and whale song provide insights into the ultimate evolutionary function of language. I discuss the ''descended larynx'' of humans, a peculiar adaptation for speech that has received much attention in the past, which despite earlier claims is not uniquely human. Then I will turn to the neural mechanisms underlying spoken language, pointing out the difficulties animals apparently experience in perceiving hierarchical structure in sounds, and stressing the importance of vocal imitation in the evolution of a spoken language. Turning to ultimate function, I suggest that communication among kin (especially between parents and offspring) played a crucial but neglected role in driving language evolution. Finally, I briefly discuss phylogeny, discussing hypotheses that offer plausible routes to human language from a non-linguistic chimp-like ancestor. I conclude that comparative data from living animals will be key to developing a richer, more interdisciplinary understanding of our most distinctively human trait: language.

The evolution of music in comparative perspective.

Abstract: In this paper, I briefly review some comparative data that provide an empirical basis for research on the evolution of music making in humans. First, a brief comparison of music and language leads to discussion of design features of music, suggesting a deep connection between the biology of music and language. I then selectively review data on animal "music." Examining sound production in animals, we find examples of repeated convergent evolution or analogy (the evolution of vocal learning of complex songs in birds, whales, and seals). A fascinating but overlooked potential homology to instrumental music is provided by manual percussion in African apes. Such comparative behavioral data, combined with neuroscientific and developmental data, provide an important starting point for any hypothesis about how or why human music evolved. Regarding these functional and phylogenetic questions, I discuss some previously proposed functions of music, including Pinker's "cheesecake" hypothesis; Darwin's and others' sexual selection model; Dunbar's group "grooming" hypothesis; and Trehub's caregiving model. I conclude that only the last hypothesis receives strong support from currently available data. I end with a brief synopsis of Darwin's model of a songlike musical "protolanguage," concluding that Darwin's model is consistent with much of the available evidence concerning the evolution of both music and language. There is a rich future for empirical investigations of the evolution of music, both in investigations of individual differences among humans, and in interspecific investigations of musical abilities in other animals, especially those of our ape cousins, about which we know little.

Protomusic and protolanguage as alternatives to protosign

Abstract: Explaining the transition from a signed to a spoken protolanguage is a major problem for all gestural theories. I suggest that Arbib's improved “beyond the mirror” hypothesis still leaves this core problem unsolved, and that Darwin's model of musical protolanguage provides a more compelling solution. Second, although I support Arbib's analytic theory of language origin, his claim that this transition is purely cultural seems unlikely, given its early, robust development in children.

Dancing to Darwin's tune

Abstract: 288 and often impressive defence of Darwin’s hypothesis, covering a wide variety of fascinating topics. Mithen first takes aim at Spencer’s idea that music is simply a non-adaptive by-product of spoken language — a viewpoint memorably expressed by Steven Pinker in his ‘music as cheesecake’ hypothesis in How the Mind Works (W. W. Norton, 1997). Mithen argues that the power of music over human emotions and behaviour is inconsistent with this hypothesis. He ably summarizes current proposals for adaptive functions of music, covering its roles in childcare, group cohesion, competition and

Formant frequencies as indicators of body size in red deer roars

Abstract: Recent studies of animal vocal communication have emphasized the potential for vocal tract resonances to encode information on the size of callers and the need for receivers to attend to this information, in particular in the context of intra‐sexual competition and inter‐sexual mate choice. Our recent work on red deer roaring, a classical example of a sexual communication signal, is reviewed here. A combination of anatomical analyses of the vocal apparatus, acoustical analyses, and playback experiments using re‐synthesized calls has enabled us to show that: (i) red deer and fallow deer males have a descended and mobile larynx, an anatomical innovation that was previously believed to be uniquely human and that enables callers to modulate their formants during vocalizing; (ii) minimum formant frequencies provide an honest indication of body size in red deer roars and (iii) stags use rivals’ minimum formant frequencies in assessment during male‐male contests, and adjust the formants of their own replies in r...