Social Functions of Signature Whistles and Whistle Imitation in Bottlenose Dolphins, Tursiops truncatus

宽吻海豚、truncatus 特征口哨和口哨模仿的社会功能

• 批准号: 9975523
• 负责人: Peter Tyack
• 金额: $ 19.22万
• 依托单位: Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution
• 依托单位国家: 美国
• 项目类别: Continuing Grant
• 财政年份: 1999
• 资助国家: 美国
• 起止时间: 1999-08-01 至 2002-07-31
• 项目状态: 已结题
• 来源: https://www.nsf.gov/awardsearch/showAward?AWD_ID=9975523&HistoricalAwards=false
• 关键词: Social; Functions; Signature; Whistles; Whistle

PI: Tyack, Peter L.Proposal #: 9975523For years, scientists have known that each bottlenose dolphin has an individually distinctive vocalization called a signature whistle. It is thought that these whistles allow dolphins to recognize each other and remain in contact in murky water. Dolphins also imitate the signature whistles of others. There are two ideas about why dolphins do this: imitating another dolphin's whistle may be a way to initiate a friendly interaction, or to aggressively challenge another dolphin. It has been difficult to confirm these ideas about dolphin communication because we humans cannot localize the source of sounds underwater, and dolphins make few visible signs to tell us which one is vocalizing. We propose to resolve this problem by studying dolphins in a naturalistic captive setting, where we can use computers and an array of underwater microphones to locate each whistle, and an overhead video system to simultaneously locate each dolphin. Knowing which dolphin is making a sound while observing their behavior will allow us to identify the social contexts in which dolphins make their own signature whistle or imitates another's whistle, and to determine how other dolphins respond to these whistles.Dolphins are unusual among non-human mammals in their ability to imitate sounds. Imitation is critical for the development of human language and music, but there is little evidence for this ability even among our closest primate relatives. Thus, comparative studies of dolphin communication may help us to understand the evolution of vocal imitation in mammals.

派：泰克，彼得·L建议多年来，科学家们已经知道，每一只宽吻海豚都有一种独特的叫声，称为标志性口哨。人们认为，这些哨声可以让海豚相互识别，并在浑浊的水中保持联系。海豚也会模仿其他海豚的标志性哨声。关于海豚为什么这样做，有两种想法：模仿另一只海豚的哨声可能是一种开始友好互动的方式，也可能是一种咄咄逼人的挑战另一只海豚的方式。很难证实这些关于海豚交流的想法，因为我们人类无法定位水下声音的来源，而且海豚几乎没有可见的手势告诉我们哪一只在发声。我们建议通过在自然圈养环境中研究海豚来解决这个问题，在这种环境中，我们可以使用计算机和一组水下麦克风来定位每一声哨子，并使用头顶视频系统来同时定位每一只海豚。在观察海豚的行为时，知道哪只海豚在发出声音，这将使我们能够识别海豚发出自己标志性的口哨或模仿另一种海豚的口哨的社会背景，并确定其他海豚对这些口哨的反应。海豚模仿声音的能力在非人类哺乳动物中是不寻常的。模仿对人类语言和音乐的发展至关重要，但几乎没有证据表明这种能力，即使在我们最亲密的灵长类亲属中也是如此。因此，对海豚交流的比较研究可能有助于我们理解哺乳动物发声模仿的进化。