The “Mute” Sex Revisited: Vocal Production and Perception Learning in Female Songbirds

Abstract

Publisher Summary Songbirds are known for their vocal versatility and the great developmental plasticity that permits or even makes it normal that adult signals are shaped by social learning processes. The chapter describes the vocal perception learning and vocal production learning in female songbirds. Song functions as an important mate attraction signal. Hence, it is often sexually dimorphic, with males typically the vocally displaying and advertising sex. The vocal perception learning in female song birds depends on recognition, song preferences, and perpetual fine tuning. Bird vocalizations are traditionally divided into calls and songs. The categorization is based both on physical characteristics of the signal (calls are shorter and less complex than songs) and also on its function. The chapter describes song learning and call learning in female song birds. Female song seems rare in comparison, and these behavioral dimorphisms also seem to map onto neuroanatomical differences in the specialized brain nuclei involved in singing. Consequently, there has been an emphasis on studying song acquisition in male songbirds. However, with female song described in a growing number of species, a new interest in the form and function of female song has surged. Likewise, theory has spawned interest in causes of variation on the receiver's side but also increasingly in the extent and function of female ornaments. With a culturally transmitted mating signal, learned preferences arise as an additional dimension next to genetically inherited and condition-dependent variation in female preferences and signaling.