Skip to main content

Thank you for visiting nature.com. You are using a browser version with limited support for CSS. To obtain the best experience, we recommend you use a more up to date browser (or turn off compatibility mode in Internet Explorer). In the meantime, to ensure continued support, we are displaying the site without styles and JavaScript.

Audience drives male songbird response to partner's voice

Nature volume 430, pages 448–451 (2004)Cite this article

Abstract

According to the social intelligence hypothesis, social context represents an important force driving the selection of animal cognitive abilities such as the capacity to estimate the nature of the social relationships between other individuals1,2,3,4. Despite this importance, the influence of this force has been assessed only in primates and never in other animals showing social interactions5,6,7. In this way, avian communication generally takes place in a network of signallers and receivers, which represents an audience altering individual signalling behaviours8,9. Indeed, vocal amplitude10 and repertoire11 are known to be socially regulated and the attitude towards the opposite sex may change depending on the audience8,12,13. This ‘audience effect’8,14,15,16 provides support for the reality of social awareness in some bird species. However no evidence has yet been found to suggest that birds are able to estimate the characteristics of the social relationships between group-mates. Here we show that the male of a gregarious songbird species—the zebra finch (Taeniopygia guttata)—pays attention to the mating status of conspecific pairs, and uses this information to control its behaviour towards its female partner.

This is a preview of subscription content, access via your institution

Relevant articles

Open Access articles citing this article.

Access options

Rent or buy this article

Prices vary by article type

from$1.95

to$39.95

Learn more

Prices may be subject to local taxes which are calculated during checkout

Figure 1: Acoustic structure of the distance call of the female zebra finch.
Figure 2: Discriminant analysis on the 17 acoustic parameters of the female call.
Figure 3: Response of male to female voices as a function of the mating status of the audience.

References

  1. Barton, R. A. & Dunbar, R. I. M. in Machiavellian Intelligence II: Extensions and Evaluations (eds Whiten, A. & Byrne, R. W.) 240–263 (Cambridge Univ. Press, Cambridge, 1997)

    Book  Google Scholar 

  2. Byrne, R. W. & Whiten, A. Machiavellian Intelligence: Social Expertise and the Evolution of Intellect in Monkeys, Apes and Humans (Clarendon, Oxford, 1988)

    Google Scholar 

  3. Dunbar, R. I. M. The social brain hypothesis. Evol. Anthropol. 6, 178–190 (1998)

    Article  Google Scholar 

  4. Adolphs, R. Cognitive neuroscience of human social behaviour. Nature Rev. Neurosci. 4, 165–178 (2003)

    Article  CAS  Google Scholar 

  5. Perry, S., Barrett, C. & Manson, J. H. White-faced capuchin monkeys show triadic awareness in their choice of allies. Anim. Behav. 67, 165–170 (2004)

    Article  Google Scholar 

  6. Jolly, A. Lemur social behaviour and primate intelligence. Science 153, 501–506 (1966)

    Article  ADS  CAS  Google Scholar 

  7. Tomasello, M. & Call, J. Primate Cognition (Oxford Univ. Press, Oxford, 1997)

    Google Scholar 

  8. Baltz, A. P. & Clark, A. B. Extra-pair courtship behaviour of male budgerigars and the effect of an audience. Anim. Behav. 53, 1017–1024 (1997)

    Article  Google Scholar 

  9. McGregor, P. K., Otter, K. & Peake, T. M. in Animal Signals: Signalling and Signal Design in Animal Communication (eds Espmark, Y., Amundsen, T. & Rosenqvist, G.) 329–340 (Tapir Academic, Trondheim, Norway, 2000)

    Google Scholar 

  10. Cynx, J. & Gell, C. Social mediation of vocal amplitude in a songbird, Taeniopygia guttata. Anim. Behav. 67, 451–455 (2004)

    Article  Google Scholar 

  11. Zann, R. The Zebra Finch: a Synthesis of Field and Laboratory Studies 196–213 (Oxford Univ. Press, Oxford, 1996)

    Google Scholar 

  12. Evans, C. S. & Evans, L. Chicken food calls are functionally referential. Anim. Behav. 58, 307–319 (1999)

    Article  CAS  Google Scholar 

  13. Evans, C. S. & Marler, P. Food calling and audience effects in male chickens, Gallus gallus: their relationships to food availability, courtship and social facilitation. Anim. Behav. 47, 1159–1170 (1994)

    Article  Google Scholar 

  14. Marler, P., Dufty, A. & Pickert, R. Vocal communication in the domestic chicken: II. Is a sender sensitive to the presence and nature of a receiver? Anim. Behav. 34, 194–198 (1986)

    Article  Google Scholar 

  15. Striedter, G. F., Freibott, L., Hile, A. G. & Burley, N. T. For whom the male calls: an effect of audience on contact call rate and repertoire in budgerigars, Melopsittacus undulatus. Anim. Behav. 65, 875–882 (2003)

    Article  Google Scholar 

  16. Johnstone, A. R. Eavesdropping and animal conflict. Proc. Natl Acad. Sci. USA 98, 9177–9180 (2001)

    Article  ADS  CAS  Google Scholar 

  17. Miller, D. B. The acoustic basis of mate recognition by female zebra finches (Taeniopygia guttata). Anim. Behav. 27, 376–380 (1979)

    Article  Google Scholar 

  18. Charrier, I., Mathevon, N. & Jouventin, P. Mother's voice recognition by seal pups. Nature 412, 873 (2001)

    Article  ADS  CAS  Google Scholar 

  19. Belin, P., Fecteau, S. & Bédard, C. Thinking the voice: neural correlates of voice perception. Trends Cogn. Sci. 8, 129–135 (2004)

    Article  Google Scholar 

  20. Insley, S. J. Long-term recognition in the northern fur seal. Nature 406, 404–405 (2000)

    Article  ADS  CAS  Google Scholar 

  21. Hessler, N. A. & Doupe, A. J. Social context modulates singing-related neural activity in the songbird forebrain. Nature Neurosci. 2, 209–211 (1999)

    Article  CAS  Google Scholar 

  22. Jarvis, E. D., Scharff, C. & Grossman, M. R. For whom the bird sings: context-dependent gene expression. Neuron 21, 775–788 (1998)

    Article  CAS  Google Scholar 

  23. Aubin, T. Syntana: a software for the synthesis and analysis of animal sounds. Bioacoustics 6, 80–81 (1994)

    Google Scholar 

  24. Sokal, R. R. & Rohlf, F. J. Biometry 57–58 & 443 (Freeman, New York, 1995)

    Google Scholar 

  25. Robinson, P., Aubin, T. & Brémond, J. C. Individuality in the voice of emperor penguin Aptenodytes forsteri: adaptation to a noisy environment. Ethology 94, 279–290 (1993)

    Article  Google Scholar 

Download references

Acknowledgements

This research was supported by the Interdisciplinary Program “Cognition and Information Processing” of the Centre National de la Recherche Scientifique (CNRS). C.V. is supported by the French Ministry of National Education. We thank C. Bouchut, M. Rabearinaivo and S. Tisseur for their help during the work, L. Bloomfield for improving the English, and I. Charrier for her advice on previous drafts of the manuscript.

Author information

Authors and Affiliations

  1. Equipe ‘Communications Acoustiques’ NAMC CNRS UMR8620, Université Paris XI-Orsay and LBA Université Jean Monnet, 42023 Cedex 2, Saint-Etienne, France

    Clémentine Vignal & Nicolas Mathevon

  2. TSI CNRS UMR5516 Université Jean Monnet, 42023 Cedex 2, Saint-Etienne, France

    Clémentine Vignal & Stéphane Mottin

Authors
  1. Clémentine Vignal
    View author publications

    You can also search for this author in PubMed Google Scholar

  2. Nicolas Mathevon
    View author publications

    You can also search for this author in PubMed Google Scholar

  3. Stéphane Mottin
    View author publications

    You can also search for this author in PubMed Google Scholar

Corresponding author

Correspondence to Nicolas Mathevon.

Ethics declarations

Competing interests

The authors declare that they have no competing financial interests.

Rights and permissions

Reprints and Permissions

About this article

Cite this article

Vignal, C., Mathevon, N. & Mottin, S. Audience drives male songbird response to partner's voice. Nature 430, 448–451 (2004). https://doi.org/10.1038/nature02645

Download citation

  • Received:

  • Accepted:

  • Issue Date:

  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1038/nature02645

This article is cited by

Comments

By submitting a comment you agree to abide by our Terms and Community Guidelines. If you find something abusive or that does not comply with our terms or guidelines please flag it as inappropriate.

Search

Advanced search

Quick links

Nature Briefing

Sign up for the Nature Briefing newsletter — what matters in science, free to your inbox daily.

Get the most important science stories of the day, free in your inbox. Sign up for Nature Briefing