Constraints on vocal production learning in budgerigars (Melopsittacus undulates)

Abstract

Budgerigars (Melopsittacus undulatus) are small Australian parrots with a well-documented, learned vocal repertoire and a high degree of vocal production learning. These birds live in large, social flocks and they vocally interact with each other in a dynamic, reciprocal manner. We assume that budgerigars must process and integrate a wide variety of sensory stimuli when selecting appropriate vocal responses to conspecifics during vocal interactions, but the relative contributions of these different stimuli to that process are next to impossible to tease apart in a natural context. Here we show that budgerigars, under operant control, can learn to respond to specific stimuli with a specific vocal response. Budgerigars were trained to produce contact calls to a combination of auditory and visual cues. Birds learned to produce specific contact calls to stimuli that differed either in location (visual or auditory) or quality (visual). Interestingly, the birds could not learn to associate different vocal responses with different auditory stimuli coming from the same location. Surprisingly, this was so even when the auditory stimuli and the responses were the same (i.e., the bird’s own contact call). These results show that even in a highly controlled operant context, acoustic cues alone were not sufficient to support vocal production learning in budgerigars. From a different perspective, these results highlight the significant role that social interaction likely plays in vocal production learning so elegantly shown by Irene Pepperberg’s work in parrots.

A Theoretical Framework for Human and Nonhuman Vocal Interaction

“…Consequently, additional model organisms are required to study how conceptual information can be linked to novel vocal elements. For example, several avian species are capable of both vocal usage learning and imitation, including corvids (Brecht et al 2019) and parrots (Osmanski et al 2021, Pepperberg 2002. Parrots in particular can associate numerous human words to objects (Pepperberg 2002), demonstrating their ability to signal an object's mental representation with learned vocal output.…”

A Theoretical Framework for Human and Nonhuman Vocal Interaction

“…Consequently, additional model organisms are required to study how conceptual information can be linked to novel vocal elements. For example, several avian species are capable of both vocal usage learning and imitation, including corvids (Brecht et al 2019) and parrots (Osmanski et al 2021, Pepperberg 2002. Parrots in particular can associate numerous human words to objects (Pepperberg 2002), demonstrating their ability to signal an object's mental representation with learned vocal output.…”