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Titi monkeys combine alarm calls to create probabilistic meaning

Previous work suggested that titi monkeys Callicebus nigrifrons combine two alarm calls, the A- and B-calls, to communicate about predator type and location. To explore how listeners process these sequences, we recorded alarm call sequences of six free-ranging groups exposed to terrestrial and aeria...

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Autores principales: Berthet, Mélissa, Mesbahi, Geoffrey, Pajot, Aude, Cäsar, Cristiane, Neumann, Christof, Zuberbühler, Klaus
Formato: Online Artículo Texto
Lenguaje:English
Publicado: American Association for the Advancement of Science 2019
Materias:
Acceso en línea:https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC6527438/
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/31123704
http://dx.doi.org/10.1126/sciadv.aav3991
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author Berthet, Mélissa
Mesbahi, Geoffrey
Pajot, Aude
Cäsar, Cristiane
Neumann, Christof
Zuberbühler, Klaus
author_facet Berthet, Mélissa
Mesbahi, Geoffrey
Pajot, Aude
Cäsar, Cristiane
Neumann, Christof
Zuberbühler, Klaus
author_sort Berthet, Mélissa
collection PubMed
description Previous work suggested that titi monkeys Callicebus nigrifrons combine two alarm calls, the A- and B-calls, to communicate about predator type and location. To explore how listeners process these sequences, we recorded alarm call sequences of six free-ranging groups exposed to terrestrial and aerial predator models, placed on the ground or in the canopy, and used multimodel inference to assess the information encoded in the sequences. We then carried out playback experiments to identify the features used by listeners to react to the available information. Results indicated that information about predator type and location were encoded by the proportion of B-call pairs relative to all call pairs of the sequence (i.e., proportion of BB-grams). The results suggest that the meaning of the sequence is not conveyed in a categorical but probabilistic manner. We discuss the implications of these findings for current theories of animal communication and language evolution.
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spelling pubmed-65274382019-05-23 Titi monkeys combine alarm calls to create probabilistic meaning Berthet, Mélissa Mesbahi, Geoffrey Pajot, Aude Cäsar, Cristiane Neumann, Christof Zuberbühler, Klaus Sci Adv Research Articles Previous work suggested that titi monkeys Callicebus nigrifrons combine two alarm calls, the A- and B-calls, to communicate about predator type and location. To explore how listeners process these sequences, we recorded alarm call sequences of six free-ranging groups exposed to terrestrial and aerial predator models, placed on the ground or in the canopy, and used multimodel inference to assess the information encoded in the sequences. We then carried out playback experiments to identify the features used by listeners to react to the available information. Results indicated that information about predator type and location were encoded by the proportion of B-call pairs relative to all call pairs of the sequence (i.e., proportion of BB-grams). The results suggest that the meaning of the sequence is not conveyed in a categorical but probabilistic manner. We discuss the implications of these findings for current theories of animal communication and language evolution. American Association for the Advancement of Science 2019-05-15 /pmc/articles/PMC6527438/ /pubmed/31123704 http://dx.doi.org/10.1126/sciadv.aav3991 Text en Copyright © 2019 The Authors, some rights reserved; exclusive licensee American Association for the Advancement of Science. No claim to original U.S. Government Works. Distributed under a Creative Commons Attribution NonCommercial License 4.0 (CC BY-NC). http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc/4.0/ This is an open-access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial license (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc/4.0/) , which permits use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, so long as the resultant use is not for commercial advantage and provided the original work is properly cited.
spellingShingle Research Articles
Berthet, Mélissa
Mesbahi, Geoffrey
Pajot, Aude
Cäsar, Cristiane
Neumann, Christof
Zuberbühler, Klaus
Titi monkeys combine alarm calls to create probabilistic meaning
title Titi monkeys combine alarm calls to create probabilistic meaning
title_full Titi monkeys combine alarm calls to create probabilistic meaning
title_fullStr Titi monkeys combine alarm calls to create probabilistic meaning
title_full_unstemmed Titi monkeys combine alarm calls to create probabilistic meaning
title_short Titi monkeys combine alarm calls to create probabilistic meaning
title_sort titi monkeys combine alarm calls to create probabilistic meaning
topic Research Articles
url https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC6527438/
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/31123704
http://dx.doi.org/10.1126/sciadv.aav3991
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