Scientists at the Hebrew University of Jerusalem recorded the natural “phee call” conversations between pairs of marmosets. They found that the marmosets use these calls to vocally address each other. Moreover, these non-human primates respond more consistently and accurately to calls directed at them.
Humans, dolphins, elephants, and marmosets are the only species known to vocalize names for other animals of their own species. Image credit: Oren others., doi: 10.1126/science.adp3757.
In the study, Guy Oren, a graduate student at the Hebrew University of Jerusalem, and his colleagues recorded natural conversations between pairs of marmosets and interactions between the monkeys and a computer system.
The researchers discovered that these monkeys use a “fee” call to address specific individuals.
Even more interesting, the marmosets were able to discern calls directed at them and responded more accurately when called.
“This discovery highlights the complexity of social communication between marmosets,” Omer said.
“These calls are not simply used to locate themselves, as previously thought. Marmosets use these specific calls to label and call to specific individuals.”
The authors also found that family members within marmoset groups use similar phonetic labels when calling different individuals and use similar phonetic features when encoding different names, which is similar to human use of names and dialects.
This learning appears to occur even among unrelated adult marmosets, suggesting that they learn both phonetic labels and dialects from other members of their family group.
Scientists think that the acoustic signatures may have evolved to help marmosets stay connected in dense forest habitats where visibility is often limited.
These calls allow primates to maintain social bonds and keep their groups cohesive.
“Marmosets live in small, monogamous family groups and care for their young together, just like humans do,” Omer said.
“These similarities suggest that they faced similar evolutionary social challenges as their early ancestors before acquiring language, which may have led to the development of similar ways of communicating.”
This study provides new insights into how social communication and human language have evolved.
“Our findings shed light on the complexity of social vocalizations in non-human primates and suggest that marmoset vocalizations may serve as a model for understanding aspects of human language and provide new insights into the evolution of social communication,” the researchers said.
of Survey results Published in a journal Science.
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Guy Oren others2024. Speech labelling of others by non-human primates. Science 385 (6712): 996-1003; doi: 10.1126/science.adp3757
Source: www.sci.news
