Hi,
Dr Christopher Sturdy is a Prof at the University of Alberta is interested
in doing some work in Chickadee communication. He is particularly
interested in North American chickadees, as they are available to test in
our operant chambers, but thinks that some more comparative perception with
European tit vocalizations would be great, too. Following his note to me he
has an abstract of what he is doing. Sounds interesting. If anybody is
willing to help contact him directly. He is setting up an FTP site so that
anybody who is willing to send him stuff can just dump it there.
Barb Beck
Edmonton, Alberta, Canada
-----Original Message-----
From: Christopher B. Sturdy
Sent: May 7, 2003 8:37 PM
To:
Subject: Chickadee recordings
Importance: High
Dear Barb,
Thank you very much for your help with our project! When you said that you
had enough recordings to keep us out of trouble for many years, I have to
say that it was music to my ears. First, for the nitty gritty of what types
of files would work the best for us. I think that as many basic, unfiltered,
non-dolby effected, pure recordings of any and all chickadee species in .wav
format would be outstanding. These could be on a CD, or whatever format
works the best for you, but more samples is definitely better for us.
On a more interesting note, hopefully, below you will find an abstract of
our research that I recently prepared for a new faculty grant application.
It is in plain language (not too much technical mumbo jumbo because I have
no idea who will review my grant) and it is about as interesting as I can
make it. In short, we study songbird communication on several levels, from
bioacoustic analysis to playback experiments to perceptual and cognitive
testing to neuroscience in an effort understand songbird communication in a
comprehensive and integrative manner that addresses issues of mechanism and
ultimate function both. I think that this blurb would be ideal to send out
to other recordists to solicit their chickadee recordings. Of course it goes
without saying that everyone who contributes recordings that are used in our
work will be gratefully acknowledged in our research papers. Moreover, I
could also send out reprints of our papers that used others' recordings to
the recordists for their interest or to add to their birder scrapbooks. Or
if they thought that our research wasn't very interesting they could just
recycle them or line their bird cages with them!
Thank you once again for your assistance, and don't hesitate to let me know
if you require more information than I have provided.
Best regards,
Chris Sturdy
p.s. if you would like to meet with us for coffee and/or a lab tour, just
let me know - we would love to show you our facility!
Abstract of Research in the Songbird Neuroethology Laboratory at the
University of Alberta
URL: http://www.psych.ualberta.ca/~csturdy/
Our research programme is aimed at understanding acoustic
communication in songbirds. Songbirds are unique because they are one of
only six animal groups, including bats, whales, parrots, hummingbirds and,
of course, humans, that learn their vocal communication sounds from a model.
That is, songbirds, like humans, learn their species-correct vocalizations
(i.e., songs and calls) along with their local dialect (the correct accent
for the region they hail from) via their caregivers early in development
during a critical period for vocal learning. Songbirds are especially useful
to study in this regard because we also have a solid understanding of the
particular brain areas that songbirds use when learning, producing and
listening to their vocalizations. Because of this, songbirds provide a
unique opportunity to study a communication system remarkably similar to
human speech.
We use several convergent experimental techniques to answer one
general question How do songbirds communicate using their songs and calls?
Our first step towards answering this question will be to determine how one
particular group of songbirds, the chickadees, perceives the acoustic
(vocal) categories contained in their calls and songs. Category perception
is a powerful cognitive tool that has been demonstrated in many animal
species, including humans and songbirds, and involves grouping large numbers
of perceptually similar stimuli into categories in an attempt to reduce
memory load and increase the speed with which a response can be mustered.
Humans use categorization so often and so effortlessly that they scarcely
realize that they are doing so. For example, if you were to view a picture a
large, four-wheeled vehicle, with a bed behind a cab where the driver and
passengers are seated, you would quickly exclaim truck, even though you
may have not ever seen this particular truck ever before. Birds too, use
this type of mental shorthand when solving the communication-related tasks
that they face each day in nature. For example, black-capped chickadee
flocks rapidly increase their vigilance behaviours after hearing the
chick-a-dee call from a different flock. What makes this ability compelling
is that they do so without having to learn through trial and error about any
one particular call. Instead, chickadees group calls originating from birds
that are not members of their own flock into a category representing
"foreign flock", and respond to the potential threat accordingly. For
songbirds, as for humans, sorting similar stimuli into categories rather
than memorizing each new instance heard allows birds to react quickly to
vocalizations that they have never before encountered.
We plan to first analyze chickadee vocalizations and determine how
several chickadee species perceive these vocalizations. Our ability to use
multiple chickadee species is in large part due to Albertas unique ecology
there are three chickadee species resident to Alberta, a situation matched
by only one other province in Canada. We will then test whether
closely-related chickadees that have similar songs and calls, perceive each
others vocalizations in a similar manner. This will help to determine the
relative contributions of genes and the environment on the perception of
learned communication sounds. These studies will lead to developmental
experiments in which hand-reared birds will grow up either isolated from
other birds or cross-fostered to (raised with) different species of
chickadees in an effort to determine how the early acoustic and social
environment influences perception. Finally, I will map the brain areas that
songbirds use to produce and perceive their vocalizations in order to relate
the results from my behavioural research to the brain areas that control
vocal production and perception.
Our research will lead to new knowledge about songbird communication
specifically, as well as serving to increase our understanding of vocal
communication generally in animals that use acoustic communication,
including humans. Studying the communication system of songbirds in a
rigorous and integrative manner will lead to insights into and potentially
an increased understanding of the highly analogous communication system
utilized by humans - speech. The results from these fundamental
investigations of communication in songbirds may one day serve to elucidate
causes and, ultimately, treatments for, speech and language pathologies such
as stuttering, aphasias, and speech loss or degradation following stroke or
brain injury.
Christopher B. Sturdy, Ph.D.
Assistant Professor
Department of Psychology
Member, Centre for Neuroscience
P441 Biological Sciences Building
University of Alberta
Edmonton, AB T6G 2E9
Canada
e-mail:
Office Phone: (780) 492-7843
Lab Phone: (780) 492-0323
Fax: (780) 492-1768
http://www.psych.ualberta.ca/~csturdy/
[Non-text portions of this message have been removed]
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