Absolute pitch (AP) is the ability to identify a tone's pitch or to produce a tone at a particular pitch without the use of an external reference pitch. AP exists in varying degrees among people generally described as AP possessors. AP possessors vary not only in the accuracy with which they can identify pitches but also in their ability to produce pitches absolutely and in their ability to identify tones of various timbers and in various pitch registers. AP possessors' memory for pitches is mediated by verbal pitch names; they do not have superior memory for pitches per se. Although the etiology of AP is not yet completely understood, evidence points toward the early-learning theory. This theory states that AP can be learned by anyone during a limited period early in development, up to about age 6, after which a general developmental shift from perceiving individual features to perceiving relations among features makes AP difficult or impossible to acquire.

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In an initial experiment, starlings (Sturnus vulgaris), cowbirds (Molothrus ater), and a mockingbird (Mimus polyglottos) learned a relative pitch discrimination between four-tone sequences that either ascended or descended in frequency within a one-octave range. They lost the discrimination completely when the frequency range was shifted either an octave above or below the initial training range. Recovery of the discrimination in the novel ranges was slow, and considerable relearning was necessary. Starlings, however (for whom the tests were conducted), easily generalized the relative pitch discrimination to new frequencies within the original training range. In a second experiment, starlings were trained on the same relative ascending-descending discrimination in two noncontiguous frequency ranges. They then lost the discrimination when transferred into a novel gap of frequencies between the original training ranges-completely counter to the outcome to be expected on the basis of stimulus generalization. The experiments show that songbirds can learn a relational discrimination between serial pitch patterns but that their ability to generalize the discrimination is constrained markedly by the frequency range in which the sound sequences are learned initially. The results have implications for human and animal perception of serial acoustic information and, more specifically, for songbirds' ability to process relative and absolute pitch.Recently, Hulse, Cynx, and Humpal (1984a) reported that European starlings (Sturnus vulgaris), a mimicking species of songbird, could discriminate between ascending and descending tone sequences on the basis of relative pitch. In this article, we describe discrimination performance when we changed the absolute pitch of the tone sequences while holding constant their

European starlings (Stumus vulgaris), a mimicking species of bird, were successfully trained to discriminate a set of temporally configured four-tone sequences that rose in pitch on a whole-tone scale from a set of otherwise identical four-tone sequences that fell in pitch. A series of transfer tests then assessed their ability to maintain the discrimination (a) when the intensity of the tones in the patterns was varied, (b) when the patterns were shortened to three, two, or one tone, and (c) when the patterns' rhythmic tempo was changed. The discrimination was maintained when intensity values changed, which indicated that apparent loudness was not a relevant cue for accurate performance. When sequences were shortened, overall discrimination performance diminished. More important, however, shortened sequences produced evidence for both absolute and relative pitch perception in sequence discrimination. That is, the discrimination depended in part on the ability to "name" particular pitches in the sequences and in part on the ability to detect that a given sequence rose or fell in pitch. Tempo changes did not affect discrimination. The results have implications for cognitive processes in serial acoustic pattern perception by animals, for a comparative study of pitch perception guided by theories encompassing absolute and relative pitch, and for research seeking the functionally significant dimensions of natural birdsong.This article describes how a species of mimicking bird, the European starling (Sturnus vulgaris), processes patterns of tones organized into arbitrary pitch structures according to rule-based principles of serial pattern learning. The research examined one of the simplest principles in pitch perception: namely, whether or not the starling can discriminate between formally organized sequences of tones that rise or fall in pitch. The research may not only add to our understanding of the basic acoustic dimensions of birdsong itself but also foster a comparative analysis of the acoustic serial pattern learning that occurs in human language and music perception.

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