Trying to uncover the roots of human speech and language has been the premier motivation
to study the signalling behaviour of nonhuman primates for several decades. Focussing on …

Syntax (rules for combining words or elements) and semantics (meaning of expressions) are
two pivotal features of human language, and interaction between them allows us to generate …

Vocal production learning, the ability to modify the structure of vocalizations as a result of
hearing those of others, has been studied extensively in birds but less attention has been …

Of the few animal groups that learn their vocalizations, songbirds are uniquely amenable to
molecular, physiological, and behavioral analyses of the neural features responsible for …

Songbirds produce calls as well as song. This paper summarizes four studies of the zebra
finch long call, used by both sexes in similar behavioral contexts. Female long calls are …

Captive parrots mimic an astonishing number of exotic sounds, including human speech.
The vocabularies of pet African grey and Amazon parrots can number hundreds of such …

Highlights•Comparative evidence supports two explanations for the origin of vocal
learning.•In one, vocal learning is favored by sexual selection for complex vocalizations.•In …

The most widely accepted hypothesis of vocal imitation in birds pre-dates many recent
studies on the behavior, anatomy, physiology and cell biology of this phenomenon. It states …

Vocal communication in nonhuman primates receives considerable research attention, with
many investigators arguing for similarities between this calling and speech in humans. Data …