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Communication and Language Flashcards

1
Q

What is the purpose of the waggle dance and which animal performs it

A

Honey bees
Provides travel instructions to others

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2
Q

Describe the waggle dance

A

Figure 8 shape with a straight section in the middle

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3
Q

What is the length of the waggle run proportionate to

A

Distance to food source

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4
Q

What is the waggle run

A

The straight section in the middle

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5
Q

What is the tempo of the waggle dance proportional to?

A

Quality of food source

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6
Q

What does the angle of the waggle dance represent

A

Angle of dance to vertical is same as direction of food source relative to the sun’s azimuth

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7
Q

What three factors of an animal have an effect on another animal

A

Appearance, sound, smell

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8
Q

What is a signal

A

any act or structure which alters the behaviour of other organisms, which evolved because of that effect, and which is effective because teh receivers response has also evolved

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9
Q

What is a cue

A

Any feature of the world, animate of inanimate, that can be used by an animal to guide future action

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10
Q

What are four examples of information that animals communicate?

A
  • Species
  • Identity, sex, status
  • Motivational state
  • Perception/knowledge of the environment
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11
Q

What are five channels through which messages are conveyed?

A

Visual
Auditory
Chemical
Behavioral
Multimodal

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12
Q

What are the two things we can distinguish between

A

What a signal is designed to do
How a dignal is designed to do it

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13
Q

What is signal design influenced by

A

the perception (senses) and cognition (learning and memory) available to the receiver

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14
Q

What is signal design known as

A

Receiver psychology

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15
Q

What are three important considerations in signal design

A
  • Detectability
  • Discriminability
  • Memorability
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16
Q

What are two examples of dishonest (manipulative) signaling

A

A chick could beg more vigorously to trick parent into giving more food than needed

A dog could growl to indicate its about to attack to trick another dog into backing down, even if it is the weaker of the two and has no intention to attack

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17
Q

What happens if signals are dishonest too often

A

Receivers stop responding or raise threshold for responding

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18
Q

What does frequent dishonest signaling lead to

A

Signals becoming exaggerated

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19
Q

What is an example of signals becoming exaggerated as a result of dishonesty

A

Female peacock wants to make sure she chooses the strongest, healthiest male, so her offspring will also be strong and healthy

Male peacock wants to appear big, strong, healthy etc, so females will mate with him

So females prefer males with larger, healthier tails à male peacocks grow bigger tails à females set the bar higher and become even choosier à etc

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20
Q

What are four ways in which the honesty of signals can be ensured

A

Common interest
Indices
Handicaps
Reoutation

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21
Q

How does common interest ensure the honesty of signals

A

When it is in the common interest of sender and receiver that the message that is communicated is accurate

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22
Q

How do indices ensure the honesty of signals

A

When the signal cannot be ‘faked’

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23
Q

How do handicaps ensure the honesty of signals

A

When a signal of the sender’s quality/ability/status is so costly that only those that can “afford” it can produce it

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24
Q

How does reputation ensure the honesty of signals

A

When there are repercussions to being dishonest through e.g. ostracism or punishment or being ignored in future by other group members

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25
Give an example of common interest signaling
Bees of the same hive are highly genetically related. Therefore what benefits one bee, will also benefit the other (even if indirectly) A dishonest signal (e.g. directing another bee to a food source that doesn’t exist) would be detrimental to the sender as well as the receiver.
26
Give an example of indices signaling
In red deer, roaring is used to settle contests between males. The deeper a stag’s the roar, the more likely the other will back down and the contest will be settled without actual fighting. A large larynx (and therefore a large body) is needed to produce a deep roar – it cannot be faked. Smaller stags physically cannot produce deep roars. Therefore, the roar provides an honest signal (or ‘index’) of the stag’s body size and hence fighting ability.
27
Give an example of handicap signaling
The male peacock’s tail hinders its ability to fly or escape from predators A male with a large tail is advertising that it is able to survive despite having such a ‘handicap’ à therefore it must be exceptionally strong/healthy A similarly large tail on a lowerquality male would be too costly – it cannot afford it
28
Give two examples of reputation signaling
Young vervet monkeys that give inappropriate alarm calls are ignored by adults Subordinate mandrills that signal aggressive intentions are ignored by dominants
29
How common is reputation signaling and what is needed for it
Examples are rare - Needs stable social groups (repeated encounters between individuals) and complex cognitive abilities (individual recognition, memory for specific past interactions)
30
How does the diversity of language vary
By region
31
How do we cluster languages?
into language families: resemblances indicate descent from common ancestral languages
32
How many languages are expected to disappear within the next century
Up to 80%
33
How is language faculty divided?
Divided into Broad (FLB) and Narrow (FLN) sense
34
What is FLB
all the different mental and physical capacities that make language possible.
35
What is FLN
the bits (if any) specific to humans and to language
36
What are the 11 key features of language?
Infinite Discrete Semantic Arbitrary Syntactical Productive Recursive Can express displacement in space and time Learnable and is transmitted culturally Capacity for prevarication Modality Independent
37
Infinite component of language
smaller, meaningless units (phonemes) combine into larger meaningful ones (words) which themselves combine into yet more complex meaning (sentences) in theoretically infinite combinations (≈ “Duality of patterning”)
38
Discrete component of language
not analogue signal that can vary in intensity; units are discrete, system digital
39
Semantic component of language
fixed associations between meaningful elements (words) and their referents (targets)
40
Arbitraty component of language
semantic connection between word & target arbitrary
41
Syntactical component of language
units (words, phrases) follow rules of ordering; meaning can vary according to order
42
Productive component of language
can express things that have never been expressed before
43
Recursive component of language
clauses can be embedded in other clauses, and those in yet other clauses, and those in yet other clauses…
44
Displacement in space and time component of language
can refer to past, present, future; here vs distant location
45
Learnable/transmitted culturally component of language
speakers of one language can learn to speak others; children learn phonemes, words, grammar from listening to others
46
Capacity for prevarication component of language
can make false statements
47
Modality independent component of language
spoken, written, signed
48
What are we not covering in this lecture
Animals being taught human language
49
How many phenomes do human languages tend to contain
Few tens
50
How can phenomes be combined
Into a theoretically infinite variety of words
51
What other animals communicate vocally
Whales and dolphins
52
What do whales and dolphins not do?
Communicate in the same way as humans
53
Describe the phonology of the chestnut crowned babler
They have a double element (flight call) and a triple element (prompt call) The individual elements are in themselves meaningless and are not used in isolation
54
What exists in non-human animal communication
Combinatorial rules
55
What is unsure about combinatorial rules
Whether different combinations bring about changes in meaning
56
What is an example of an animal that communicates via combinatorial rules
Captive bottlenose dolphins
57
Describe what happened in captive bottlenose dolphin communication
Two individuals trained (one acoustic, one gestural) In tests, instructed to carry out named actions (fetch) on named objects (ball) and named modifiers (left)
58
What were captive bottlenose dolphins able to generalize
to sentences with novel lexical & structural information – including 5-word sentences
59
What two phrases could bottlenose dolphins generalize
SURFACE HOOP FETCH BOTTOM BASKET (go to the hoop at the surface and take it to the basket at the bottom) BOTTOM BASKET FETCH SURFACE HOOP (go to the basket at the bottom and take it to the hoop at the surface)
60
What two things did the birdsong demonstrate
Hierarchical structure Syntactic constraints
61
Describe hierarchical structure in the birdsong
Notes -> syllable -> motifs -> bouts
62
What is an example of syntactic constraints
upcoming motif often predictable from previous one
63
What does lack of semanticity in birdsong mean?
means that sequence changes are likely to alter message strength but not message type
64
What do referential signals mean
they refer to external objects or events and are meaningful to receivers
65
Which animal displays referential signals and what is the reason for it
Vervet monkey alarm calls
66
Describe Vervet monkey alarm calls
Specific to type of predator (bark call = leopard, cough call = eagle, chutter call = snake) Different calls elicit different responses in receivers (“leopard”: climb tree; “eagle”: look up then run for cover; ”snake” = rear up & search)
67
What are four other examples of animals that use referential signals
Siberian jay predator alarm calls Meerkat predator alarm calls Chimpanzee food calls Dog growls for different social situations
68
What quote by Townsend and Manser describes referential signals
“One of the difficulties lies in distinguishing calls induced by external referents rather than being the expression of the emotional and motivational state of an animal experiencing a given behavioural context”
69
What animal potentially exhibits semanticity and syntax
Campbell monkey
70
What is an important note about campbell monkey alarm calls
the same suffix has this effect in both cases – “-oo” acts as abstract meaning operator
70
Describe how the Campell monkey potentially demonstrates semanticity and syntax
In their alarm calls, “-oo” suffix transforms predator-specific calls into calls indicating less specific (but spatially defined) disturbance
71
What is learnability
Speakers of one language can learn to speak another
72
What two animals can learnability be seen in
Populations of birds Humpback whales
73
How do populations of birds demonstrate learnability
Different dialects are used by different populations of birds and cetaceans; migration events can lead to dialect changes
74
How do Humpback Whales demonstrate learnability
their song revolution... Different humpback whale songs are spreading east with each successive year à “cultural waves”
75
What is prevarication
Ability to make false statements
76
What is an example of prevarication and why is this done
Chimpanzee recruitment screams (~calls for help when attacked)
77
Describe Chimpanzee recruitment screams
Acoustic structure varies with severity of aggression Victims exaggerated true level of aggression (only) if there was at least one listener in the audience who matched or surpassed the aggressor in rank
78
What is displacement
Message refers to objects/events removed from present in space or time
79
Give two examples of displacement
Honeybee “waggle dance” Symbol-trained chimpanzees
80
How does the Honeybee waggle dance show displacement
Signifies location distant from signaller and receiver Signifies location distant from signaller and receiver
81
How do symbol-trained chimpanzees demonstrate displacement
Subjects can indicate type and location of object hidden at distant (though <30m)
82
What may be missing in displacement
Temporal displacement
83
What is a possible example of temporal displacement being missing
wild orangutans delay alarm calling for predator until it is out of sight – i.e. give info about a past encounter?
84
What is unique about recursion and who proposed this idea
Proposed by Hauser, Chomsky & Fitch (2002) to be the only feature of language unique to humans (i.e. the only element in the FLN subset)
85
What is recursion
Embedding of a constituent in a constituent of the same type
86
Give an example of center-embedding
The man with the dog saw the woman
87
Give an example of tail-embedding
The man with the dog saw the woman
88
Give two examples of infinite recursion
“[The man [with the dog [that bit the girl [with the pearl earring [that we took [from the ….... ]]]] saw the woman]” “The watch that belongs to my uncle’s friend’s cousin’s girlfriend’s housemate’s driving instructor’s ……..”
89
What is infinite recursion limited by
Memory
90
Give an example embedding of a constituent in a constituent of the same type
If the clause is AB, then AAABBB exhibits recursion (where AB is center-embedded in another AB, which is embedded in another AB)
91
What two animals have studies looked for recursion in
Songbirds and primates
92
Describe the studies in which recursion was looked for in songbirds and primates
Task: listen to playback of stream of sequences of A and B syllables, indicate when you notice ABABAB structure changing into AAABBB or vice versa Task: listen to playback of stream of sequences of A and B syllables, indicate when you notice ABABAB structure changing into AAABBB or vice versa Task: listen to playback of stream of sequences of A and B syllables, indicate when you notice ABABAB structure changing into AAABBB or vice versa
93
Describe a follow up study of recursion in Starlings
Using more natural sounds (starling song motifs), Gentner et al (2006) suggest starlings can process different types of patterning rules, including center-embedded recursive structures a’s and b’s are different types of “rattle” and “warble” motifs
94
What two things did starlings show
a’s and b’s are different types of “rattle” and “warble” motifs a’s and b’s are different types of “rattle” and “warble” motifs
95
What is the caveat of the Starling study
no test of generalization to other kinds of motifs (not rattle/warble) à might have been that the birds learnt something more simple about acoustic qualities of the stimuli …. ALSO: trained rather than innate?
96

Animal Minds (17 decks)

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