Journal ArticleDOI
BIRDSONG AND HUMAN SPEECH: Common Themes and Mechanisms
TLDR
Human speech and birdsong have numerous parallels, with striking similarities in how sensory experience is internalized and used to shape vocal outputs, and how learning is enhanced during a critical period of development.Abstract:
Human speech and birdsong have numerous parallels. Both humans and songbirds learn their complex vocalizations early in life, exhibiting a strong dependence on hearing the adults they will imitate, as well as themselves as they practice, and a waning of this dependence as they mature. Innate predispositions for perceiving and learning the correct sounds exist in both groups, although more evidence of innate descriptions of species-specific signals exists in songbirds, where numerous species of vocal learners have been compared. Humans also share with songbirds an early phase of learning that is primarily perceptual, which then serves to guide later vocal production. Both humans and songbirds have evolved a complex hierarchy of specialized forebrain areas in which motor and auditory centers interact closely, and which control the lower vocal motor areas also found in nonlearners. In both these vocal learners, however, how auditory feedback of self is processed in these brain areas is surprisingly unclear. Finally, humans and songbirds have similar critical periods for vocal learning, with a much greater ability to learn early in life. In both groups, the capacity for late vocal learning may be decreased by the act of learning itself, as well as by biological factors such as the hormones of puberty. Although some features of birdsong and speech are clearly not analogous, such as the capacity of language for meaning, abstraction, and flexible associations, there are striking similarities in how sensory experience is internalized and used to shape vocal outputs, and how learning is enhanced during a critical period of development. Similar neural mechanisms may therefore be involved.read more
Citations
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Journal ArticleDOI
Contribution of spike timing to the information transmitted by HVC neurons
Chloé Huetz,Chloé Huetz,Catherine Del Negro,Catherine Del Negro,Nicolas Lebas,Nicolas Lebas,Philippe Tarroux,Jean-Marc Edeline,Jean-Marc Edeline +8 more
TL;DR: Information theory methods demonstrate that a much larger proportion of neurons than expected based on spike‐count only participate in the discrimination between stimuli, which is higher for the forward than for the reverse BOS, whatever the day length and the cell type are.
Dissertation
The role of imitation in learning to pronounce
TL;DR: This article proposed a role for the typical vocal interaction of early childhood where a mother reformulates ('imitates') her child's output, reflecting back the linguistic intentions she imputes to him.
Journal ArticleDOI
Hemispheric Asymmetry in New Neurons in Adulthood Is Associated with Vocal Learning and Auditory Memory
TL;DR: The results suggest that new neurons may contribute to an allocation of function between the hemispheres that underlies the learning and processing of complex signals.
Journal ArticleDOI
Differences in acoustic features of vocalizations produced by killer whales cross-socialized with bottlenose dolphins
TL;DR: That killer whales produce similar repertoires when associated with another species suggests substantial vocal plasticity and motivation for vocal conformity with social associates and shows that killer whales are capable of contextual learning.
Journal ArticleDOI
The relationship between perception and production in songbird vocal imitation: what learned calls can teach us.
TL;DR: It is demonstrated that calls complement song as a potent tool for studying the neurobiology of vocal communication and play a role in long call discrimination.
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