Sperm whale (physeter macrocephalus) They are highly social mammals that use clicks to communicate. New research shows that, just like in human language, they can combine and coordinate different clicks and rhythms to create complex calls.
Communication is important for social animals to make group decisions and coordinate collaborative tasks such as foraging and raising children.
Sperm whales are social mammals that communicate with each other by clicking repeatedly.
Little else is known about sperm whales' communication systems, although some of their clicks have previously been shown to communicate their identity.
“Cetaceans are an important group for studying evolution and the development of sophisticated communication systems,” said Pratyusha Sharma, a researcher at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT), and colleagues.
“Among cetaceans, long-term observational studies of sperm whales describe both a culturally defined, multilayered matrilineal society and a socially transmitted communication system.”
“Sperm whales are known for their complex social and foraging behaviors, as well as their collective decision-making.”
“They communicate using codas, stereotypical sequences of three to 40 broadband clicks. Codas are exchanged when whales interact with each other and during long, deep dives foraging. .”
For the study, the authors Dominican Sperm Whale Projectthe largest repository of sperm whale data.
They analyzed the records of about 60 different whales from the eastern Caribbean sperm whale clan and used them to define a “sperm whale phonetic alphabet” of click combinations from this clan's records.
They discovered that whales' communication systems are more complex and have greater information-transfer capabilities than previously thought.
We found that the combination and structure of the generated click sequences depended on the context of the individual's conversation.
Scientists also identified a “combinatorial structure” in whale language. Whales can combine and coordinate different clicks and rhythms to create complex vocalizations, similar to human language.
“Although the function and meaning of the click combinations are still unknown, the sperm whale language could potentially express a large number of meanings,” the researchers said.
Their paper It was published in the magazine nature communications.
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P. Sharma other. 2024. Contextual and combinatorial structure in sperm whale calls. Nat Commune 15, 3617; doi: 10.1038/s41467-024-47221-8
Source: www.sci.news
