Equipment for birdsong collection, playback and analysis

该提案要求为正在进行的声学感知研究计划提供录音、播放和分析鸣禽发声所需的音响设备。以前的研究主要集中在歌曲的生产在男性和经验与成人发声是必要的年轻的雄性鸟类学习产生物种适当的发声，特别是歌曲。对歌曲和其他发声的感知，以及早期经验对感知的影响，特别是在女性中，研究得少得多。我使用行为和神经措施来检查黑顶山雀和其他物种对发声的反应，以研究鸟类如何处理声音信号中的信息，雄性和雌性，幼鸟和成年鸟，以及正常和隔离饲养的鸟类。我还研究了季节性对感知的影响，例如，适当的季节发声（即在春天的歌曲）是否处理不同的发声不适当的季节（即在秋天的歌曲）。 该设备将允许我在野外和实验室中向鸟类播放声音，以研究它们对歌曲的行为（例如发声）和神经（例如立即早期基因活动）反应，并记录这些反应以供分析并在未来的实验中用作刺激。这将是一个关键的和不可分割的一套设备，在这个实验室的研究，并将获得全年使用的学生完成研究生和本科学位。

This proposal requests sound equipment necessary for recording, playing, and analysing vocalizations of songbirds for an ongoing research program on acoustic perception. Previous research on song has primarily focused on song production in males and how experience with adult vocalizations is necessary for young male birds to learn to produce species-appropriate vocalizations, especially song. Perception of song and other vocalizations, and the effects of early experience on perception, especially in females has been studied far less. I use both behavioural and neural measures to examine response to vocalizations in black-capped chickadees and other species to study how the bird processes information in acoustic signals, whether there are differences in how vocalizations are processed by males and females, by young and adult birds, and by normally and isolate-reared birds. I also examine the effects of seasonality on perception, for example, whether vocalizations appropriate to the season (i.e. song in spring) are processed differently than vocalizations inappropriate to the season (i.e. song in fall). This equipment will allow me to play sounds to birds in both the field and the lab in order to study their behavioural (e.g. vocalizations) and neural (e.g. immediate-early gene activity) responses to song, and to record these responses for analyses and use as stimuli in future experiments. It will be a critical and integral set of equipment for research in this laboratory and will gain year-round use by students completing both graduate and undergraduate degrees.