Ronan of Sea Lion Likely Outshines You at Keeping the Beat

Meet Ronan, a California sea lion who probably has better rhythm than you do.

Researchers have demonstrated that Ronan, a resident at the Long Marine Lab at the University of California, Santa Cruz, was the first non-human mammal trained to keep the beat through movement to music. This took place back when Ronan was young, in 2013. Recently, scientists decided to reassess the skills of this now 15-year-old sea lion, revealing not only an enhancement in her ability to bob her head in sync with the music but also that she outperformed most humans in doing so.

“This ultimately shows that humans aren’t the only mammals that can sustain a beat,” said Tecumse Fitch, a cognitive biologist studying biomimetics at the University of Vienna, who was not involved in the new research. The findings were published on Thursday in Scientific Reports.

Parrots are known to keep the beat through their movements, and recent studies have highlighted similar rhythmic abilities in monkeys and other mammals such as rats. However, over a decade later, “the rhythmic abilities of sea lions are distinctly recognized among non-human vertebrates,” Dr. Fitch stated.

Researchers worked with Ronan for several months, focusing on enhancing her accuracy with the original tempos she had learned. They then compared her ability to maintain the beat now to when she was three years old.

The team evaluated Ronan’s ability to move her head to a tempo of 112, 120, and 128 beats per minute, contrasting her head movements with those of 10 individuals aged 18-23 moving their arms. “The hands function similarly to a sea lion’s head, and their arms resemble the necks of a sea lion in size, making it a valid comparison for measuring movement capabilities.”

Across all assessment parameters analyzed by Dr. Cook and his team, Ronan topped the class.

“Ronan outperformed everyone on every measure of accuracy and consistency,” stated Dr. Cook. “In all respects, she excelled beyond most people, truly setting herself apart.”

Ronan’s headbanging abilities sparked debate in 2013 regarding whether her skills could truly be compared to those of humans, as well as whether such behavior is common in the animal kingdom or restricted to species capable of learning complex vocalizations, like humans and parrots, which allow spontaneous rhythmic movement.

“What Ronan does appears indistinguishable from what humans are adept at,” Dr. Cook remarked. He believes that the new findings about Ronan’s capabilities further challenge the assumption that rhythmic timing is inherent only to vocal learners.

Some scientists challenge this conclusion.

Aniruddh D. Patel, a cognitive neuroscientist at Tufts University, maintains that the ability to naturally synchronize with music is exclusive to certain species that can inherently learn complex vocal patterns.

He suggests further research into the vocal learning abilities of sea lions would corroborate this hypothesis. Nonetheless, he emphasizes that the “crucial distinction” lies in the fact that Ronan has been trained to keep the beat.

Moving forward, Dr. Cook and his colleagues aim to investigate whether Ronan can maintain rhythm with less predictable beats.

“Can she adjust her tempo by speeding up or slowing down? Can she handle variations that aren’t steady?” Dr. Cook questioned. “These are things that humans excel at. Can non-humans do them?”