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What songbirds teach us about learning

Abstract

Bird fanciers have known for centuries that songbirds learn their songs. This learning has striking parallels to speech acquisition: like humans, birds must hear the sounds of adults during a sensitive period, and must hear their own voice while learning to vocalize. With the discovery and investigation of discrete brain structures required for singing, songbirds are now providing insights into neural mechanisms of learning. Aided by a wealth of behavioural observations and species diversity, studies in songbirds are addressing such basic issues in neuroscience as perceptual and sensorimotor learning, developmental regulation of plasticity, and the control and function of adult neurogenesis.

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Figure 1: Birdsongs consist of ordered, often highly stereotyped strings of sounds separated by brief silent intervals.
Figure 2: Timelines for song learning.
Figure 3: Neural substrates for learning: the song system.
Figure 4: Song selectivity.

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Acknowledgements

We are grateful to M. Kao for thoughtful comments on the manuscript and help with figures. Work in the authors' laboratories is supported by the NIH, the Sandler Family Supporting Foundation, NARSAD and the Grable Foundation, and the Kirsch Foundation.

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Correspondence to Michael S. Brainard.

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Brainard, M., Doupe, A. What songbirds teach us about learning. Nature 417, 351–358 (2002). https://doi.org/10.1038/417351a

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