Vocal learning

Vocal learning is the ability to modify vocalizations by learning sounds from other individuals or the environment. It occurs in humans and several other animal groups, but not all vocal communication depends on it.

Auditory feedback: Sensory information about sounds produced by oneself or another source. Vocal learners compare their output with heard sounds and adjust it.
Birdsong: The vocal communication system of birds, often involving learned songs used in courtship or territory defense. Many songbirds provide experimentally tractable examples of vocal learning.
Vocal production learning: Learning that changes the acoustic structure of sounds an individual produces. This narrower capacity distinguishes altered sound production from learning when or why to call.
Vocal learning hypothesis of speech evolution: The proposal that evolved capacities for vocal learning contributed to the emergence of human speech. It links animal vocal learning to explanations of speech's evolutionary foundations.
Sensorimotor learning: Learning that links sensory input with changes in movement. It connects heard vocal targets to the motor commands that produce them.
Humpback whale song: The patterned vocal display of male humpback whales, which changes and spreads among populations. Its cultural transmission demonstrates vocal change across large social groups.
Vocal usage learning: Learning to use an existing vocalization in a new context without changing its acoustic form. It can change call use without meeting the stricter definition of vocal learning.
Convergent evolution: The independent evolution of similar traits in distinct lineages. Vocal learning appears to have evolved independently in several animal groups.
Vocal imitation: The production of sounds modeled on sounds heard from another individual. It is one observable route by which learners acquire new vocal patterns.
Bottlenose dolphin signature whistle: A distinctive learned whistle used by a bottlenose dolphin and recognized by other dolphins. Signature whistles show vocal learning in a mammal outside the human and bat lineages.

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