Mind the gap – moving beyond the dichotomy between intentional gestures and emotional facial and vocal signals of nonhuman primates

The anatomy of the nonhuman primate vocal tract is not fundamentally different from the human one. Notwithstanding, nonhuman primates are remarkably unskillful at controlling vocal production and at combining basic call units into more complex strings. Instead, their vocal behavior is linked to specific psychological states, which are evoked by events in their social or physical environment. Humans are the only primates that have evolved the ability to produce elaborate and willfully controlled vocal signals, although this may have been a fairly recent invention. Despite their expressive limitations, nonhuman primates have demonstrated a surprising degree of cognitive complexity when responding to other individuals' vocalizations, suggesting that, as recipients, crucial linguistic abilities are part of primate cognition. Pivotal aspects of language comprehension, particularly the ability to process semantic content, may thus be part of our primate heritage. The strongest evidence currently comes from Old World monkeys, but recent work indicates that these capacities may also be present in our closest relatives, the chimpanzees.

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From birdsong to speech: a plea for comparative approaches

Anais da Academia Brasileira de Ciências ◽

10.1590/s0001-37652004000200003 ◽

2004 ◽

Vol 76 (2) ◽

pp. 201-208 ◽

Cited By ~ 3

Author(s):

Dietmar Todt

Keyword(s):

Auditory Perception ◽

Nonhuman Primates ◽

Evolutionary Strategies ◽

Human Infants ◽

Memory Research ◽

Specific Memory ◽

Vocal Signals ◽

Luscinia Megarhynchos ◽

The Common ◽

Vocal Signaling

Human language and speech are unique accomplishments. Nevertheless, they share a number of characteristics with other systems of communication, and investigators have thus compared them to birdsong and the vocal signaling of nonhuman primates. Particular interesting parallels concern the development of singing and speaking. These behaviors rely on auditory perception, subsequent memorization and finally, the generation of vocal imitations. Several mechanisms help young individuals to deal with the various challenges during the time of signal development. Specific differences aside, astounding parallels can be found also in how a human and a particularly accomplished bird like the Common Nightingale Luscinia megarhynchos treat the experience of many different sound patterns or songs. As a consequence of such exposure, both human infants and young birds eventually acquire large repertoires of verbal or vocal signals. These achievements, however, require access to specific memory mechanisms which are well adapted to the purposes they serve, thereby allowing them to fulfil their species typical roles. With such aspects as a reference, birdsong is an excellent biological model for memory research and also an appropriate system for the study of evolutionary strategies in a very successful class of organisms.

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