Mondegreens and Soramimi as a Method to Induce Misperceptions of Speech Content – Influence of Familiarity,Wittiness, and Language Competence

Expectations and prior knowledge can strongly influence our perception. In vision research, such top-down modulation of perceptual processing has been extensively studied using ambiguous stimuli, such as reversible figures. Here, we propose a novel method to address this issue in the auditory modality during speech perception by means of Mondgreens and Soramimi which represent song lyrics with the potential for misperception within one or across two languages, respectively. We demonstrate that such phenomena can be induced by visual presentation of the alternative percept and occur with a sufficient probability to exploit them in neuroscientific experiments. Song familiarity did not influence the occurrence of such altered perception indicating that this tool can be employed irrespective of the participants’ knowledge of music. On the other hand, previous knowledge of the alternative percept had a strong impact on the strength of altered perception which is in line with frequent reports that these phenomena can have long-lasting effects. Finally, we demonstrate that the strength of changes in perception correlated with the extent to which they were experienced as amusing as well as the vocabulary of the participants as source of potential interpretations. These findings suggest that such perceptional phenomena might be linked to the pleasant experience of resolving ambiguity which is in line with the long-existing theory of Hermann von Helmholtz that perception and problem-solving recruit similar processes.     

Neural Substrates for Semantic Memory of Familiar Songs: Is There an Interface between Lyrics and Melodies?

Findings on song perception and song production have increasingly suggested that common but partially distinct neural networks exist for processing lyrics and melody. However, the neural substrates of song recognition remain to be investigated. The purpose of this study was to examine the neural substrates involved in the accessing “song lexicon” as corresponding to a representational system that might provide links between the musical and phonological lexicons using positron emission tomography (PET). We exposed participants to auditory stimuli consisting of familiar and unfamiliar songs presented in three ways: sung lyrics (song), sung lyrics on a single pitch (lyrics), and the sung syllable ‘la’ on original pitches (melody). The auditory stimuli were designed to have equivalent familiarity to participants, and they were recorded at exactly the same tempo. Eleven right-handed nonmusicians participated in four conditions: three familiarity decision tasks using song, lyrics, and melody and a sound type decision task (control) that was designed to engage perceptual and prelexical processing but not lexical processing. The contrasts (familiarity decision tasks versus control) showed no common areas of activation between lyrics and melody. This result indicates that essentially separate neural networks exist in semantic memory for the verbal and melodic processing of familiar songs. Verbal lexical processing recruited the left fusiform gyrus and the left inferior occipital gyrus, whereas melodic lexical processing engaged the right middle temporal sulcus and the bilateral temporo-occipital cortices. Moreover, we found that song specifically activated the left posterior inferior temporal cortex, which may serve as an interface between verbal and musical representations in order to facilitate song recognition.     

The cost of being “real”: black authenticity,colourism, and Billboard Rap Chart rankings

Research on black authenticity identifies “oppressive othering” and “white standards of beauty”, particularly lighter skin tone, as key components. Few studies disentangle which of these two theoretical components matter the most for a particular outcome. Rap music, whose lyrics are often categorized as authentic expressions of blackness, offers an intriguing case to compare the effects of “oppressive othering” (as alcohol and drug lyrics) and “white standards of beauty” (as the rap artist’s skin tone) on national music charts. Analysing artists’ skin tone and lyrical content of songs ranked on Billboard Rap Year-End Charts from 2007 to 2011, results show that lighter skin tone is significantly and positively related to higher chart rankings. Alcohol and drug lyrics, however, had a non-significant effect. Implications are discussed in relation to the effects of the commodified imagery of “authentic” blackness in the new digital era of music.     

Syncopation,Body-Movement and Pleasure in Groove Music

Moving to music is an essential human pleasure particularly related to musical groove. Structurally, music associated with groove is often characterised by rhythmic complexity in the form of syncopation, frequently observed in musical styles such as funk, hip-hop and electronic dance music. Structural complexity has been related to positive affect in music more broadly, but the function of syncopation in eliciting pleasure and body-movement in groove is unknown. Here we report results from a web-based survey which investigated the relationship between syncopation and ratings of wanting to move and experienced pleasure. Participants heard funk drum-breaks with varying degrees of syncopation and audio entropy, and rated the extent to which the drum-breaks made them want to move and how much pleasure they experienced. While entropy was found to be a poor predictor of wanting to move and pleasure, the results showed that medium degrees of syncopation elicited the most desire to move and the most pleasure, particularly for participants who enjoy dancing to music. Hence, there is an inverted U-shaped relationship between syncopation, body-movement and pleasure, and syncopation seems to be an important structural factor in embodied and affective responses to groove.     

How social experience shapes song representation in the brain of starlings

Birdsong, like speech, is a learned behaviour whose critical function is to communicate with others and whose development critically depends on social influences. Song learning is a complex phenomenon that involves not only the development of species-specific vocalisations, but also the development of the ability to organise these vocalisations and to use them in an appropriate context. Although the fact that interactions with adult experienced models are essential for song production to develop properly has been well established, far less is known about song perception and processing. The fact that songbirds learn to vocalise and to use their vocalisations selectively through interactions with adults questions whether such interactions are also required for songbirds to perceive and process their vocalisations selectively and whether social interactions may shape song perception and processing as they shape song production. In order to address these questions, our team uses an original neuroethological approach to study the neural bases of song behaviour in a highly social songbird species: the European starlings. We provide here a synthesis of the results we have obtained using this approach over the last decade. Our results show that direct social experience with adult experienced models not only shapes song behaviour but also shapes these songbirds’ brains and their ability to perceive and to process acoustic signals whose communicative value, as well as their acoustic structure, have to be learned.     

Age-dependent effects of song exposure: song crystallization sets a boundary between fast and delayed vocal imitation

Song crystallization is a prominent developmental phase of oscine birds in which there is a transition from a production of plastic vocal material to a performance of elaborated song patterns that are typical for adult birds. Here we show that crystallization can be related to a marked change in memory properties involved in supplementary learning of song occurring during this phase. We studied nightingales, Luscinia megarhynchos, a species renowned for its large repertoire of song types. After a period of early tutoring as fledglings, hand-reared subjects (N=8) were exposed to a set of temporally distributed training experiences as juveniles and young adults. Analyses of the birds' singing yielded clear evidence for late song learning and also a striking phase-related shift in their memory properties. New songs heard shortly before crystallization (at an age of 40-42 weeks) were imitated within a few days and their structural and syntactical ‘quality’ seemed not to be inferior to imitations developed from songs heard earlier. In contrast, none of the songs experienced soon after song crystallization (at 45-47 weeks) appeared as imitations in the repertoires of the young adults (at 48-55 weeks). However, birds had clearly memorized these songs, as they produced imitations of them in their second spring. Our findings show that auditory song acquisition in nightingales extends well into the phase of vocal production. At the same time, however, the boundary between an immediate and a delayed form of vocal imitation suggests that song crystallization reflects a marked change in memory properties. That is, song crystallization seems to constrain the ability to develop motor programs for song patterns that are heard even though these are committed to memory. Copyright 2003 Published by Elsevier Science Ltd on behalf of The Association for the Study of Animal Behaviour.      

Metal Music and Mental Health in France

Although numerous authors have associated metal music with social problems such as suicide, self-destruction and Satanism, few studies have been undertaken to examine the mental health of fans of heavy metal music. This study attempts to determine if there is a link between mental health and the enjoyment of this type of music in France. The researchers surveyed 333 fans of metal music. Their mental health was evaluated by the Hospital Anxiety and Depression Scale (HADS), a widely used instrument that measures anxiety and depression. The scores of the sample of metal music fans were then compared to the scores that reveal possible, probable, or severe mental disorders. Qualifying variables included age, gender, status, education, motivation and participation in metal music culture. The results indicated that fans of metal music are mainly young adults (median age = 22.67, SD = 5.29) and tend to be male (87.85 percent). As a whole, metal music fans have levels of anxiety and depression that are similar to and lower than levels in the general population. Specifically, <5 percent of metal music fans surveyed showed pathological symptoms. Subjects that scored higher levels of anxiety and depression were those that had literary and/or arts backgrounds rather than scientific backgrounds, that wrote metal music lyrics, that consumed alcohol and that engaged in the body modification practice of scarification. This study suggests that opponents of metal music should re-examine the basis for their criticism. More scholarly research is needed to better understand the effects of metal music on fans and on society.     

Music recognition by Japanese children with cochlear implants

Congenitally deaf Japanese children with cochlear implants were tested on their recognition of theme songs from television programs that they watched regularly. The children, who were 4-9 years of age, attempted to identify each song from a closed set of alternatives. Their song identification ability was examined in the context of the original commercial recordings (vocal plus instrumental), the original versions without the words (i.e., karaoke versions), and flute versions of the melody. The children succeeded in identifying the music only from the original versions, and their performance was related to their music listening habits. Children gave favorable appraisals of the music even when they were unable to recognize it. Further research is needed to find means of enhancing cochlear implants users' perception and appreciation of music.     

AUDITORY EXPERIENCE AND SONG DEVELOPMENT IN THE CHAFFINCH FRINGILLA COELEBS

The present paper describes the results of experiments designed to evaluate the importance of auditory-motor experience in the development of song in the Chaffinch. For this purpose a number of Chaffinches collected as nestlings or adults were deafened by extirpating the cochlea at different ages. Recordings of their song made subsequently provide the material on which the paper is based. Since the results of the experiments can only be interpreted in the light of knowledge of normal song development, the latter is described from the observation of previous workers and from some new material. Of the 20 males deafened, only three came into full song of their own accord; song was induced in the rest by the administration of testosterone phenylacetate or testosterone propionate. Songs of abnormal length were common among first-year males though males deafened when two or more years old produced song of the normal length. The song of male Chaffinches deafened as adults, that is after they had produced full song for one or more breeding seasons, was infistinguishable from that produced by intact adult males. They even went through a “plastic” song stage in which some “intermediate” themes occurred. A first-year male deafened when it had almost stabilized its song produced song that gradually deviated more and more from normal song. This indicates that the bird had not yet laid down a long-term memory of its song independent of auditory feedback. First-year male Chaffinches deafened during early spring, mid-winter and late sumer, respectively, show that the more they were deprived of the normal period of auditory-motor experience, the simpler was the song they produced in their first spring. Thus, at the time of deafening they had acquired a particular auditory-motor experience, and it is the type of element established up to that time that is incorporated into full song. Male chaffinches brought into the laboratory as nestlings and deafened when three months old produced a virtually sfyctureless song, in which the only recognizable element was a sound reminiscent of the juvenile “chirrup”. The subsong and other calls of these birds were also highly abnormal. Song development in the Chaffinch clearly starts before song as such has made its appearance. The available evidence suggests that the kind of song a male Chaffinch produces depends directly on its auditory-motor experience before deafening. There is no indication that deafening achieves its effects on the resultant song by interfering with the hormonal substrate. Relatively stable song end patterns develop in the absence of auditory feedback, so their occurrence does not necessitate the postulation of templates or preconceived patterns. Song development differs markedly from species to species.     

Song Learning in Bengalese Finches: a Comparison with Zebra Finches

Male Bengalese finches, Lonchura striata var. domestica, learn their song from an adult male conspecific with whom they can interact at 35 to 70 days of age and normally-raised males fail to reproduce song which they have only heard before or after this time. Birds which have been raised by their mother alone and those which have been deprived of a song tutor during the learning phase produce abnormal songs with indistinct elements and little or no phrase structure; this is typical of males which fail to hear adult song during their development. These songs are unstable and are replaced by normal songs, if there is an opportunity to learn from an adult male conspecific. Presumably, this flexibility in the time when young males learn acts as a safeguard to ensure that normal conspecific song is produced. These results bear striking similarity to those on zebra finch song development. Differences between the two species, especially in the learning of call notes by female zebra finches, are discussed.     

‘Cross-cultural’ practices: interpreting non-African-American participation in hip-hop dance

This article examines how participants interpret a cultural practice commonly associated with a race other than their own. Determining if, how and why participants experience such ‘cross-cultural’ forms in racialized terms can clarify whether these practices promote tolerance or essentialism in everyday life, and whether they enable appropriation in the field of cultural production. Through interviews and participant observation with non-African-American women learning and teaching hip-hop dance, I capture a spectrum of participant views. Most dancers see hip-hop as African American in its origins. But while novices often speak of an inherent or learned authenticity among blacks, experts rarely express racialized views of the dance's contemporary practice. Experts' views are shaped by personal ability, exposure to dancers whose ability is not racially patterned, and exposure to others who accept their skill. How dancers act on these interpretations challenges common associations of racialized views with tolerance, and non-racialized views with appropriation.     

Delayed vocal ontogeny in songbirds: a laboratory study validates a model for delayed development derived from field studies

Based on field studies, we proposed a model that describes how vocal ontogeny proceeds over a 2-year period in wild brown-headed cowbirds (Molothrus ater). We tested this model in the laboratory by exposing yearling male cowbirds (n?=?7 tutees), trapped at the start of the breeding season in a southern California dialect, to adult tutors with unfamiliar song types from a different dialect. As adults at the start of their second season, the tutees all had enlarged repertoires based almost entirely on tutor song types. Thus, tutees dropped song types in their yearling repertoires that did not match tutor types and added tutor songs that they had heard for the first time as yearlings in captivity. We discuss these findings in the context of a previous captivity study in which tutees also changed their yearling repertoires but generally failed to copy their tutors’ songs. This is the first laboratory study to fully replicate the delayed ontogeny we have described for wild cowbirds, and validates the delayed vocal development model we proposed. This model is important in a more general context, because it explains how song dialects can remain temporally stable despite immigration by young males with non-local songs.     

Juvenile sparrows preferentially eavesdrop on adult song interactions

Recent research has demonstrated that bird song learning is influenced by social factors, but so far has been unable to isolate the particular social variables central to the learning process. Here we test the hypothesis that eavesdropping on singing interactions of adults is a key social event in song learning by birds. In a field experiment, we compared the response of juvenile male song sparrows (Melospiza melodia) to simulated adult counter-singing versus simulated solo singing. We used radio telemetry to follow the movements of each focal bird and assess his response to each playback trial. Juveniles approached the playback speakers when exposed to simulated interactive singing of two song sparrows, but not when exposed to simulated solo singing of a single song sparrow, which in fact they treated similar to heterospecific singing. Although the young birds approached simulated counter-singing, neither did they approach closely, nor did they vocalize themselves, suggesting that the primary function of approach was to permit eavesdropping on these singing interactions. These results indicate that during the prime song-learning phase, juvenile song sparrows are attracted to singing interactions between adults but not to singing by a single bird and suggest that singing interactions may be particularly powerful song-tutoring events.     

Maturation‐dependent control of vocal temporal plasticity in a songbird

Birdsong is a unique model to address learning mechanisms of the timing control of sequential behaviors, with characteristic temporal structures consisting of serial sequences of brief vocal elements (syllables) and silent intervals (gaps). Understanding the neural mechanisms for plasticity of such sequential behavior should be aided by characterization of its developmental changes. Here, we assessed the level of acute vocal plasticity between young and adult Bengalese finches, and also quantified developmental change in variability of temporal structure. Acute plasticity was tested by delivering aversive noise bursts contingent on duration of a target gap, such that birds could avoid the noise by modifying their song. We found that temporal variability of song features decreased with birds' maturation. Noise‐avoidance experiments demonstrated that maximal changes of gap durations were larger in young that in adult birds. After these young birds matured, the maximal change decreased to a similar level as adults. The variability of these target gaps also decreased as the birds matured. Such parallel changes suggest that the level of acute temporal plasticity could be predicted from ongoing temporal variability. Further, we found that young birds gradually began to stop their song at the target gap and restart from the introductory part of song, whereas adults did not. According to a synaptic chain model for timing sequence generation in premotor nuclei, adult learning would be interpreted as adaptive changes in conduction delays between chain‐to‐chain connections, whereas the learning of young birds could mainly depend on changes of the connections. © 2017 Wiley Periodicals, Inc. Develop Neurobiol 77: 995–1006, 2017     

Statistical and Prosodic Cues for Song Segmentation Learning by Bengalese Finches (Lonchura striata var. domestica)

Juvenile songbirds learn their songs from adults. Birds do not simply learn songs verbatim but they sometimes learn parts of songs from multiple tutors and recombine these into one song sequence. How they segment a particular part and select that as a chunk and how these chunks are recombined are interesting questions to ask, because such segmentation and chunking is also considered to be a basic mechanism in human language acquisition. The song of the Bengalese finch has a complex syntax with variable note‐to‐note transition probabilities and could thus be suitable for the study of segmentation and chunking in birdsong. Thirty‐two male Bengalese finch chicks were reared in a large aviary where 11 adult tutors and 10 adult females were breeding freely. In this environment most male chicks learned songs from several tutors. The song note‐chunks that juveniles copied had higher transition probabilities and shorter silent intervals than did the boundaries of the chunks, suggesting that Bengalese finches segment songs using both statistical and prosodic cues. Thus, the Bengalese finch could prove to be an excellent model in which to study neural and behavioral mechanism for sound segmentation.     

Reaching a Better Understanding of the Control of Bimanual Movements in Older Adults

The ability to interact skilfully with the environment is essential for independent living and therefore a critical factor for the aging population. Here we investigate the differences between young and older adults in a bimanual reaching task where the goal is to bring two objects together to the same location with a synchronous placement. Older (mean age 74) and young (mean age 20) adults were asked to pick up two spatially disparate objects, one in each hand, and bring them together to place them in one of three trays laid out in front of them from left to right. The results showed that the older adults were no more detrimentally affected than the young by asymmetric bimanual movements compared to symmetric ones, and both groups completed their movements in the same time. Nevertheless, compared to the young, the older adult group produced reaches characterised by higher peak velocities (although this effect was marginal), shorter hover times, and where the movement distance varied for each hand the scaling of the kinematic profile across the two limbs diverged from that found with younger participants. They then spent longer than the young in the final adjustment phase and during this phase they made more adjustments than the young, and as a result were more synchronous in terms of the final placement of the objects. It seems that the older adults produced reach movements that were designed to reach the vicinity of the tray quite rapidly, after which time they made discreet adjustments to their initial trajectories in order to exercise the precision necessary to place the objects in the tray. These findings are consistent with the idea that older adults have problems using online control (as they wait until they can fixate both objects before making adjustments).     

Social influences during song development in the song sparrow: a laboratory experiment simulating field conditions

Oscine songbirds are exposed to many more songs than they keep for their final song repertoire and little is known about how a bird selects the particular song(s) to sing as an adult. We simulated in the laboratory the key variables of the natural song learning environment and examined the song selection process in nine hand-reared male song sparrows, Melospiza melodia, a species in which males sing 5-11 song types. During their second and third months (their presumed sensitive period), subjects were rotated equally among four live adult male tutors that had been neighbours in the field. Tutors were housed in individual aviary 'territories' in four corners of the roof of a building; subjects could see only one tutor at a time, but they could hear the others at a short distance. Later in their first year (months 5-12), half the subjects were again rotated among all four tutors and the other half were randomly stationed next to just one tutor. Results from this experiment confirm and extend the findings from our two previous field studies of song learning in this species. Young males in this experiment (1) learned whole song types, (2) learned songs from multiple tutors, (3) preferentially learned songs that were shared among their tutors, (4) learned songs that other young males in their group also chose, and (5) learned more songs from the tutor they were stationed next to during the later stage (stationary subjects). These last two results support the late influence hypothesis that interactions after a bird's sensitive period affect song repertoire development. Copyright 2000 The Association for the Study of Animal Behaviour.     

Latent song type memories are accessible through auditory stimulation in a hand-reared songbird

The production of learned vocalizations such as in birdsong is often used to judge whether stimuli had been memorized upon their presentation. However, failures in the imitation of certain song patterns may also reflect impaired development of motor programmes or impaired memory retrieval rather than failures in stimulus memorization during auditory acquisition. To study this issue, we confronted adult hand-reared nightingales, Luscinia megarhynchos, with interactive playback experiments and used vocal matching as a behavioural tool to investigate their song type memories. Vocal matching is a common pattern-specific response that songbirds use in territorial countersinging. We distinguished two forms of pattern-specific matching: (1) song type matching (i.e. a bird replied with the same song type as the stimulus song), and (2) song group matching (i.e. the bird replied with a different song type which was, however, sequentially associated with the playback song presented earlier, i.e. during the tutoring). Some subjects used both song type and song group matching in response to song types they had not imitated from the tutor programme prior to the playback experiments. Our results indicate that nightingales store more song types in their sensory phase than they spontaneously recall from memory as adults. That is, memories of song types that were not performed in overt behaviour could be activated by vocal interactions, here induced by the interactive playback. Copyright 2002 The Association for the Study of Animal Behaviour. Published by Elsevier Science Ltd. All rights reserved.     

Spatial movements and social networks in juvenile male song sparrows

The time between fledging and breeding is a critical period in songbird ontogeny, but the behavior of young songbirds in the wild is relatively unstudied. The types of social relationships juveniles form with other individuals can provide insight into the process through which they learn complex behaviors crucial for survival, territory establishment, and mate attraction. We used radio telemetry to observe social associations of young male song sparrows (Melospiza melodia) from May to November. Juvenile song sparrows were frequently observed in social flocks and generally associated with more birds in the summer than in the autumn months. Most juvenile subjects formed stable social relationships with other birds and were seen with the same individual on up to 60% of the days observed. The strongest associations occurred with other juvenile males, and these individuals were often seen <1 m from the subject, even when the subject moved large distances between tracking observations. Associations also had long-term behavioral consequences as subjects were more likely to establish territories near their associates and learn shared song types. Our results indicate that male song sparrows spend a large percentage of the juvenile life stage forming social relationships and suggest that these associations may be important for the ecology of young birds and the ontogeny of their behaviors.