Dear colleagues,
The following article is to appear in the upcoming issue of Aquatic Mammals:
Deecke, V. B. 2006. Studying marine mammal cognition in the wild - a
review of four decades of playback experiments. Aquatic Mammals, 32,
461-482.
ABSTRACT:
The playback of sounds to animals to assess their behavioural responses
presents a powerful tool to study animal cognition in the wild. While
playbacks are commonly used to study acoustic responses in birds and
other terrestrial animals, their application to the study of marine
mammal cognition so far has been limited. A survey of the published
literature on field playback experiments with marine mammals identified
46 studies, with a trend towards increased use of playback approaches in
recent years. Field playbacks to marine mammals have been used to
address questions of wildlife management, the impact of anthropogenic
noise, acoustic interactions between predators and prey, individual and
kin recognition, as well as the function of communicative sounds. This
paper summarizes the major findings of marine mammal playbacks to date
and reviews recent advances in the design and execution of playback
experiments, with special reference to marine mammals. Issues concerning
appropriate presentation of acoustic stimuli, appropriate quantification
of behavioural responses, as well as appropriate control and replication
of treatments are discussed. An analysis of replication in marine mammal
playbacks showed that the use of a small number of playback stimuli to
conduct multiple playback trials (pseudoreplication) was common. This
overview of playback experiments in the study of marine mammal cognition
in the wild showed that such approaches contribute significantly to the
field; however, in many cases there appears to be substantial room for
improvement of playback procedure and experimental design.
KEYWORDS:
playback experiments; response; marine mammals; cetaceans; pinnipeds;
mother-offspring recognition; communication; experimental design;
pseudoreplication; controlled exposure experiments
Please e-mail me for details.
Kind regards
Volker Deecke
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Volker Deecke, Ph.D.
Marine Mammal Research Unit Cetacean Research Lab
University of BC Vancouver Aquarium Marine Science Centre
AERL Bldg., 2202 Main Mall P.O. Box 3232
Vancouver, BC, V6T 1Z4 Vancouver, BC V6B 3X8
Canada Canada
Phone: +1.604.822.9150 +1.604.659.3429/3430
Fax: +1.604.822.8180 +1.604.659.3599
WWW: http://www.marinemammal.org/MMRU
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