Acoustic profiling in a complexly social species, the American crow: caws encode information on caller sex, identity, and behavioural context.
Ontology highlight
ABSTRACT:
SUBMITTER: Mates EA
PROVIDER: S-EPMC4237024 | biostudies-literature | 2015
REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature
Publications
Acoustic profiling in a complexly social species, the American crow: caws encode information on caller sex, identity, and behavioural context.
Mates Exu Anton EA Tarter Robin R RR Ha James C JC Clark Anne B AB McGowan Kevin J KJ
Bioacoustics 20150101 1
Previous research on inter-individual variation in the calls of corvids has largely been restricted to single call types, such as alarm or contact calls, and has rarely considered the effects of age on call structure. This study explores structural variation in a contextually diverse set of "caw" calls of the American crow (<i>Corvus brachyrhynchos</i>), including alarm, foraging recruitment and territorial calls, and searches for structural features that may be associated with behavioural conte ...[more]
Similar Datasets
Project description:Non-vocal, or unvoiced, signals surprisingly have received very little attention until recently especially when compared to other acoustic signals. Some sounds made by terrestrial vertebrates are produced not only by the larynx but also by the syrinx. Furthermore, some birds are known to produce several types of non-syrinx sounds. Besides mechanical sounds produced by feathers, bills and/or wings, sounds can be also produced by constriction, anywhere along the pathway from the lungs to the lips or nostrils (in mammals), or to the bill (in birds), resulting in turbulent, aerodynamic sounds. These noises often emulate whispering, snorting or hissing. Even though hissing sounds have been studied in mammals and reptiles, only a few studies have analyzed hissing sounds in birds. Presently, only the hissing of small, nesting passerines as a defense against their respective predators have been studied. We studied hissing in domestic goose. This bird represents a ground nesting non-passerine bird which frequently produces hissing out of the nest in comparison to passerines producing hissing during nesting in holes e.g., parids. Compared to vocally produced alarm calls, almost nothing is known about how non-vocal hissing sounds potentially encode information about a caller's identity. Therefore, we aimed to test whether non-vocal air expirations can encode an individual's identity similar to those sounds generated by the syrinx or the larynx. We analyzed 217 hissing sounds from 22 individual geese. We calculated the Potential for Individual Coding (PIC) comparing the coefficient of variation both within and among individuals. In addition, we conducted a series of 15 a stepwise discriminant function analysis (DFA) models. All 16 acoustic variables showed a higher coefficient of variation among individuals. Twelve DFA models revealed 51.2-54.4% classification result (cross-validated output) and all 15 models showed 60.8-68.2% classification output based on conventional DFA in comparison to a 4.5% success rate when classification by chance. This indicates the stability of the DFA results even when using different combinations of variables. Our findings showed that an individual's identity could be encoded with respect to the energy distribution at the beginning of a signal and the lowest frequencies. Body weight did not influence an individual's sound expression. Recognition of hissing mates in dangerous situations could increase the probability of their surviving via a more efficient anti-predator response.
| S-EPMC7694559 | biostudies-literature
Project description:Familiar and unfamiliar voice perception are often understood as being distinct from each other. For identity perception, theoretical work has proposed that listeners use acoustic information in different ways to perceive identity from familiar and unfamiliar voices: Unfamiliar voices are thought to be processed based on close comparisons of acoustic properties, while familiar voices are processed based on diagnostic acoustic features that activate a stored person-specific representation of that voice. To date no empirical study has directly examined whether and how familiar and unfamiliar listeners differ in their use of acoustic information for identity perception. Here, we tested this theoretical claim by linking listeners' judgements in voice identity tasks to complex acoustic representation - spectral similarity of the heard voice recordings. Participants (N = 177) who were either familiar or unfamiliar with a set of voices completed an identity discrimination task (Experiment 1) or an identity sorting task (Experiment 2). In both experiments, identity judgements for familiar and unfamiliar voices were guided by spectral similarity: Pairs of recordings with greater acoustic similarity were more likely to be perceived as belonging to the same voice identity. However, while there were no differences in how familiar and unfamiliar listeners used acoustic information for identity discrimination, differences were apparent for identity sorting. Our study therefore challenges proposals that view familiar and unfamiliar voice perception as being at all times distinct. Instead, our data suggest a critical role of the listening situation in which familiar and unfamiliar voices are evaluated, thus characterising voice identity perception as a highly dynamic process in which listeners opportunistically make use of any kind of information they can access.
| S-EPMC8381763 | biostudies-literature
Project description:The ability to signal individual identity using vocal signals and distinguish between conspecifics based on vocal cues is important in several mammal species. Furthermore, it can be important for receivers to differentiate between callers in reproductive contexts. In this study, we used acoustic analyses to determine whether male koala bellows are individually distinctive and to investigate the relative importance of different acoustic features for coding individuality. We then used a habituation-discrimination paradigm to investigate whether koalas discriminate between the bellow vocalisations of different male callers. Our results show that male koala bellows are highly individualized, and indicate that cues related to vocal tract filtering contribute the most to vocal identity. In addition, we found that male and female koalas habituated to the bellows of a specific male showed a significant dishabituation when they were presented with bellows from a novel male. The significant reduction in behavioural response to a final rehabituation playback shows this was not a chance rebound in response levels. Our findings indicate that male koala bellows are highly individually distinctive and that the identity of male callers is functionally relevant to male and female koalas during the breeding season. We go on to discuss the biological relevance of signalling identity in this species' sexual communication and the potential practical implications of our findings for acoustic monitoring of male population levels.
| S-EPMC3102089 | biostudies-literature
Project description:Faces of different people elicit distinct fMRI patterns in several face-selective regions of the human brain. Here we used representational similarity analysis to investigate what type of identity-distinguishing information is encoded in three face-selective regions: fusiform face area (FFA), occipital face area (OFA), and posterior superior temporal sulcus (pSTS). In a sample of 30 human participants (22 females, 8 males), we used fMRI to measure brain activity patterns elicited by naturalistic videos of famous face identities, and compared their representational distances in each region with models of the differences between identities. We built diverse candidate models, ranging from low-level image-computable properties (pixel-wise, GIST, and Gabor-Jet dissimilarities), through higher-level image-computable descriptions (OpenFace deep neural network, trained to cluster faces by identity), to complex human-rated properties (perceived similarity, social traits, and gender). We found marked differences in the information represented by the FFA and OFA. Dissimilarities between face identities in FFA were accounted for by differences in perceived similarity, Social Traits, Gender, and by the OpenFace network. In contrast, representational distances in OFA were mainly driven by differences in low-level image-based properties (pixel-wise and Gabor-Jet dissimilarities). Our results suggest that, although FFA and OFA can both discriminate between identities, the FFA representation is further removed from the image, encoding higher-level perceptual and social face information.SIGNIFICANCE STATEMENT Recent studies using fMRI have shown that several face-responsive brain regions can distinguish between different face identities. It is however unclear whether these different face-responsive regions distinguish between identities in similar or different ways. We used representational similarity analysis to investigate the computations within three brain regions in response to naturalistically varying videos of face identities. Our results revealed that two regions, the fusiform face area and the occipital face area, encode distinct identity information about faces. Although identity can be decoded from both regions, identity representations in fusiform face area primarily contained information about social traits, gender, and high-level visual features, whereas occipital face area primarily represented lower-level image features.
| S-EPMC7939092 | biostudies-literature
Project description:The ability to discriminate changes in the fine structure of complex sounds is well developed in birds. However, the precise limit of this discrimination ability and how it is used in the context of natural communication remains unclear. Here we describe natural variability in acoustic fine structure of male and female zebra finch calls. Results from psychoacoustic experiments demonstrate that zebra finches are able to discriminate extremely small differences in fine structure, which are on the order of the variation in acoustic fine structure that is present in their vocal signals. Results from signal analysis methods also suggest that acoustic fine structure may carry information that distinguishes between biologically relevant categories including sex, call type and individual identity. Combined, our results are consistent with the hypothesis that zebra finches can encode biologically relevant information within the fine structure of their calls. This study provides a foundation for our understanding of how acoustic fine structure may be involved in animal communication.
| S-EPMC5906677 | biostudies-literature
Project description:Group living animals often engage in corporate territorial defence. Territorial group vocalizations can provide information about group identity, size and composition. Neighbouring groups may use this information to avoid unfavourable direct conflicts. Giant otters are highly social and territorial animals with an elaborate vocal repertoire. They produce long-range screams when they are alert or excited, i.e. in an alarm, isolation or begging context. Long-range screams are not only produced by one individual at a time ('single screams') but also by multiple group members simultaneously, resulting in a highly conspicuous 'group chorus'. Wild giant otters regularly produce group choruses during interactions with predators, when they detect intruders in their territory or before group reunions after separation. Since single screams and especially group choruses probably contribute to the groups' corporate territorial defence, we hypothesized that group identity is encoded in single screams and group choruses. We analysed vocalizations from five wild and three captive giant otter groups and found statistical evidence for a group signature in group choruses. Results for single screams were less conclusive, which might have been caused by the comparatively lower sample size. We suggest that giant otters may gain information on group identity by listening to group choruses. Group identity likely constitutes important social information for giant otters since territory boundaries of neighbouring groups can overlap and direct inter-group conflicts are severe. Therefore, group chorusing may contribute to the mutual avoidance of members from different groups.
| S-EPMC5638252 | biostudies-literature
Project description:Bird species often use flight calls to engage in social behavior, for instance maintain group cohesion and to signal individual identity, kin or social associations, or breeding status of the caller. Additional uses also exist, in particular among migrating songbirds for communication during nocturnal migration. However, our understanding of the information that these vocalizations convey is incomplete, especially in nocturnal scenarios. To examine whether information about signaler traits could be encoded in flight calls we quantified several acoustic characteristics from calls of a nocturnally migrating songbird, the American Redstart. We recorded calls from temporarily captured wild specimens during mist-netting at the Powdermill Avian Research Center in Rector, PA. We measured call similarity among and within individuals, genders, and age groups. Calls from the same individual were significantly more similar to one another than to the calls of other individuals, and calls were significantly more similar among individuals of the same sex than between sexes. Flight calls from hatching-year and after hatching-year individuals were not significantly different. Our results suggest that American Redstart flight calls may carry identifiers of gender and individual identity. To our knowledge, this is the first evidence of individuality or sexual dimorphism in the flight calls of a migratory songbird. Furthermore, our results suggest that flight calls may have more explicit functions beyond simple group contact and cohesion. Nocturnal migration may require coordination among numerous individuals, and the use of flight calls to transmit information among intra- and conspecifics could be advantageous. Applying approaches that account for such individual and gender information may enable more advanced research using acoustic monitoring.
| S-EPMC4902225 | biostudies-literature
Project description:Animals are known to select mates to maximize the genetic diversity of their offspring in order to achieve immunity against a broader range of pathogens. Although several bird species preferentially mate with partners that are dissimilar at the major histocompatibility complex (MHC), it remains unknown whether they can use olfactory cues to assess MHC similarity with potential partners. Here we combined gas chromatography data with genetic similarity indices based on MHC to test whether similarity in preen secretion chemicals correlated with MHC relatedness in the black-legged kittiwake (Rissa tridactyla), a species that preferentially mates with genetically dissimilar partners. We found that similarity in preen secretion chemicals was positively correlated with MHC relatedness in male-male and male-female dyads. This study provides the first evidence that preen secretion chemicals can encode information on MHC relatedness and suggests that odor-based mechanisms of MHC-related mate choice may occur in birds.
| S-EPMC4220275 | biostudies-literature
Project description:Defining an acoustic repertoire is essential to understanding vocal signalling and communicative interactions within a species. Currently, quantitative and statistical definition is lacking for the vocalisations of many dasyurids, an important group of small to medium-sized marsupials from Australasia that includes the eastern quoll (Dasyurus viverrinus), a species of conservation concern. Beyond generating a better understanding of this species' social interactions, determining an acoustic repertoire will further improve detection rates and inference of vocalisations gathered by automated bioacoustic recorders. Hence, this study investigated eastern quoll vocalisations using objective signal processing techniques to quantitatively analyse spectrograms recorded from 15 different individuals. Recordings were collected in conjunction with observations of the behaviours associated with each vocalisation to develop an acoustic-based behavioural repertoire for the species. Analysis of recordings produced a putative classification of five vocalisation types: Bark, Growl, Hiss, Cp-cp, and Chuck. These were most frequently observed during agonistic encounters between conspecifics, most likely as a graded sequence from Hisses occurring in a warning context through to Growls and finally Barks being given prior to, or during, physical confrontations between individuals. Quantitative and statistical methods were used to objectively establish the accuracy of these five putative call types. A multinomial logistic regression indicated a 97.27% correlation with the perceptual classification, demonstrating support for the five different vocalisation types. This putative classification was further supported by hierarchical cluster analysis and silhouette information that determined the optimal number of clusters to be five. Minor disparity between the objective and perceptual classifications was potentially the result of gradation between vocalisations, or subtle differences present within vocalisations not discernible to the human ear. The implication of these different vocalisations and their given context is discussed in relation to the ecology of the species and the potential application of passive acoustic monitoring techniques.
| S-EPMC5501449 | biostudies-literature
Project description:The brain has an extraordinary ability to create an internal spatial map of the external world [1]. This map-like representation of environmental surroundings is encoded through specific types of neurons, located within the hippocampus and entorhinal cortex, which exhibit spatially tuned firing patterns [2, 3]. In addition to encoding space, these neurons are believed to be related to contextual information and memory [4-7]. One class of such cells is the grid cells, which are located within the entorhinal cortex, presubiculum, and parasubiculum [3, 8]. Grid cell firing forms a hexagonal array of firing fields, a pattern that is largely thought to reflect the operation of intrinsic self-motion-related computations [9-12]. If this is the case, then fields should be relatively uniform in size, number of spikes, and peak firing rate. However, it has been suggested that this is not in fact the case [3, 13]. The possibility exists that local spatial information also influences grid cells, which-if true-would greatly change the way in which grid cells are thought to contribute to place coding. Accordingly, we asked how discriminable the individual fields of a given grid cell are by looking at the distribution of field firing rates and reproducibility of this distribution across trials. Grid fields were less uniform in intensity than expected, and the pattern of strong and weak fields was spatially stable and recurred across trials. The distribution remained unchanged even after arena rescaling, but not after remapping. This suggests that additional local information is being overlaid onto the global hexagonal pattern of grid cells.
| S-EPMC5558037 | biostudies-literature