Integrative Studies of a Model Learning System

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ABSTRACT PI: Beecher Proposal Numbers: 9632193 Bird song is widely recognized as a model system for nvestigations into the biological basis of learning. It provides the best example to date of natural learning in a vertebrate, with many striking parallels to human language learning. Moreover, in recent years many discoveries concerning the brain mechanisms underlying song learning have suggested that this model system may reveal much about the general processes of learning in the brain. We propose to use both field and laboratory studies to examine song learning. We believe that the field perspective is crucial for understanding the song learning process, because the rules of song learning we have discovered in the field turn out to be quite different from the rules that had been inferred from laboratory studies. The first important goal of the proposed studies is to resolve and understand the discrepancies between the field and laboratory findings to date, because the utility of this model system for study of neurobiological correlates will be undermined if the laboratory studies are unduly artificial and produce artifactual results. A second goal of the work is to compare individuals from sedentary populations (resident in the same area throughout the year) and migratory populations (breeding and wintering grounds widely separated) of a species. There are a variety of reasons for predicting that animals from these populations will be very different with respect to both song learning and song usage in communication. These studies will allow us to assess the relative contributions of proximate ecological differences aad population genetic differences in producing song learning differences between sedentary and migratory populations. A third goal is to evaluate the role of females in the development of male song. In most North American species of songbirds, females do not sing, but t here is considerable evidence that they can strongly influence both the development and phylogeny of male song traits. A fourth goal of the work is to examine individuals use of their vocal repertoire for communication in natural ontexts, and effects of vocal repertoire for communication in natural contexts, and the effects of vocal repertoire differences among individuals on their survival and lifetime reproductive success.