The Species-Repertoire of Whistled Songs in the European Starling: Species- Specific Characteristics and Variability

Adret-Hausberger, Martine

doi:10.1080/09524622.1989.9753123

Cited by 26 publications

(14 citation statements)

References 17 publications

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“…Their responses and their position near the ventral border of the HVC, where Margoliash et al (1994) had identified neurons with very long dendrites going out of the HVC borders, led us to hypothesize that they may have direct connections with the field L complex (see also Kelley and Nottebohm, 1979). The universal class I whistles are the most involved in the vocal interactions between males, have similar basic structures in all populations, and show little change over time (Adret-Hausberger, 1982, 1989. It seems likely that both the requirements for song matching and the processing of these structurally simple songs might not need a more complex treatment than that observed in the field L complex, which is based on some combinations of structural parameters (Hausberger et al, 2000).…”

Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 97%

State‐dependent hemispheric specialization in the songbird brain

George¹,

Cousillas²,

Richard³

et al. 2005

J of Comparative Neurology

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Lateralization of brain functions is a widespread phenomenon in vertebrates. With the well-known lateralization in the processing of human speech and the parallels that exist between birdsong and language, songbirds are interesting for addressing such questions. In the present study, we investigated the central processing of communicative and artificial sounds in starlings, in an integrative part of the song system: the HVC. Neuronal responses to acoustic stimuli were systematically recorded in both hemispheres while the birds were awake, and then anesthetized, allowing quantitative comparisons of the responses obtained in each situation. The total proportion of responsive sites in the HVC of the left and right hemispheres of all birds revealed a significant predominance of the HVC of the right hemisphere when the birds were awake, whereas a high interindividual variability appeared when the birds were anesthetized. When neuronal responses as a whole were further examined, the responses to each type of stimulus appeared to be nonrandomly distributed over the different situations, and some specialization may appear. The results suggest a complex and state-dependent hemispheric specialization toward behaviorally relevant classes of stimuli. In awake birds, the HVC of the left hemisphere may be more involved in the processing of songs that are used in individual recognition at distance, whereas the HVC of the right hemisphere may deal with long and complex sequences of a song that is involved in short-distance communication, especially between males and females. With birds under anesthesia, this pattern is strongly modified.

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Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 97%

State‐dependent hemispheric specialization in the songbird brain

George¹,

Cousillas²,

Richard³

et al. 2005

J of Comparative Neurology

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“…We used the same set of stimuli consisting of 12 artificially modified and natural variants corresponding to three different whistle themes (duration range 450–850 ms). These themes have been shown to be especially important in the social life of birds and are used in interactions (Adret‐Hausberger, 1989). These stimuli were filtered and analysed using an Amiga 3000 programmed for sound analysis and synthesis (Richard, 1991).…”

Section: Methodsmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…To our knowledge, the effect of early experience on the functional organization of auditory areas has never been investigated in songbirds until now. However, hand‐raised birds do not develop normal songs if they are isolated from adult song (Adret‐Hausberger, 1989; Chaiken et al ., 1993, 1994, 1997; Brainard & Doupe, 2000), although some structural aspects of songs are better organized when animals are raised in pairs or groups of young birds (Chaiken et al ., 1997; Sturdy et al ., 2001). Therefore the question of whether the central perceptual areas are affected by early auditory deprivation is particularly appropriate.…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Experience‐dependent neuronal specialization and functional organization in the central auditory area of a songbird

Cousillas

Richard

Mathelier

et al. 2004

Eur J of Neuroscience

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The effect of early experience on brain development was investigated in the central auditory area of a songbird, the field L complex, which is analogous to the mammalian auditory cortex. Multi-unit recordings of auditory responses in the field L complex of adult starlings raised without any experience of adult song during development provide strong evidence of developmental plasticity both in the neuronal responses and in the functional organization of this area. Across the entire area, experimental birds, separated from adults from the age of 1 week old until they were 2 years old, had a much larger number of neurons that responded to all the stimuli than did control birds. The well-known tonotopy demonstrated in adult wild birds using the same procedure was altered. This study is the first to bring evidence of developmental plasticity in the organization of the central auditory areas in songbirds. These results are discussed in relation to other reports on effects of early experience on brain development.

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“…In European starlings (Sturnus vulgaris) whistle-like song types showed little variation, while other song types were extremely variable (Adret-Hausberger, 1989). It is likely that in this case different song types serve different functions: the shared song is used for species recognition, while variable song types are used to increase complexity supported by sexual selection.…”

Section: Proximate Mechanisms Of Dialect Changementioning

confidence: 99%

Cultural evolution of killer whale calls: background, mechanisms and consequences

Filatova

Samarra

Deecke

et al. 2015

Behav

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Cultural evolution is a powerful process shaping behavioural phenotypes of many species including our own. Killer whales are one of the species with relatively well-studied vocal culture. Pods have distinct dialects comprising a mix of unique and shared call types; calves adopt the call repertoire of their matriline through social learning. We review different aspects of killer whale acoustic communication to provide insights into the cultural transmission and gene-culture co-evolution processes that produce the extreme diversity of group and population repertoires. We argue that the cultural evolution of killer whale calls is not a random process driven by steady error accumulation alone: temporal change occurs at different speeds in different components of killer whale repertoires, and constraints in call structure and horizontal transmission often degrade the phylogenetic signal. We discuss the implications from bird song and human linguistic studies, and propose several hypotheses of killer whale dialect evolution.

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The Species-Repertoire of Whistled Songs in the European Starling: Species- Specific Characteristics and Variability

Cited by 26 publications

References 17 publications

State‐dependent hemispheric specialization in the songbird brain

State‐dependent hemispheric specialization in the songbird brain

Experience‐dependent neuronal specialization and functional organization in the central auditory area of a songbird

Cultural evolution of killer whale calls: background, mechanisms and consequences

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