Research has shown sound-symbolic associations between speech sounds and conceptual and/or perceptual properties of a referent. This study used the choice response time method to investigate hypothesized associations between a high/low vowel and spatial concepts of up/down and above/below. The participants were presented with a stimulus that moved either upward or downward (Experiments 1 and 2), or that was located above or below the reference stimulus (Experiment 3), and they had to pronounce a vowel ([i] or [æ]) based on the spatial location of the stimulus. The study showed that the high vowel [i] was produced faster in relation to the up-directed and the above-positioned stimulus, while the low vowel [æ] was produced faster in relation to the down-directed and the below-positioned stimulus. In addition, the study replicated the pitch-elevation effect showing a raising of the vocalization pitch when vocalizations were produced to the up-directed stimulus. The article discusses these effects in terms of the involvement of sensorimotor processes in representing spatial concepts.

The present study addresses the questions whether on-farm use of local anaesthesia with lidocaine leads to a reduction in pain responses during castration, and whether the non-steroidal anti-inflammatory drug meloxicam improves technical performance after castration of piglets. Five treatments were included in the study: (1) castration without anaesthesia or analgesia (CAST), (2) castration after local anaesthesia with lidocaine (LIDO), (3) castration after administration of meloxicam (MELO), (4) castration after lidocaine and meloxicam (L + M) and (5) sham castration (SHAM). To reduce litter influences, each treatment was present in each of the 32 litters (n = 32 per treatment). During castration, vocalizations were recorded continuously. Blood samples were collected 15 min before and 20 min after castration for determination of plasma levels of total cortisol, glucose, lactate and creatine kinase (CK). Mortality was registered and piglets were weighed several times to calculate growth. Several aspects of vocalizations during castration showed consistent and significantly different levels in CAST compared with LIDO, L + M and SHAM. CAST piglets squealed longer, louder and higher. Vocalizations of MELO piglets most resembled those of CAST. An increase in cortisol was seen in all treatments. However, in SHAM piglets this increase was significantly lower than in the other treatments. LIDO piglets showed a significantly smaller increase in plasma cortisol levels compared with CAST and MELO. L + M piglets differed significantly only from the SHAM group. Lactate levels differed significantly between LIDO and MELO, the level in LIDO being decreased after castration. In the other treatments an increase was measured. No treatment effects were found in plasma glucose and CK levels, nor in growth and mortality of the piglets. In conclusion, on the basis of vocalizations and plasma cortisol, local anaesthesia with lidocaine reduces pain responses in piglets during castration. A positive effect of meloxicam on technical performance was not found.

The article analyzes the neural and functional grounding of language skills as well as their emergence in hominid evolution, hypothesizing stages leading from abilities known to exist in monkeys and apes and presumed to exist in our hominid ancestors right through to modern spoken and signed languages. The starting point is the observation that both premotor area F5 in monkeys and Broca's area in humans contain a “mirror system” active for both execution and observation of manual actions, and that F5 and Broca's area are homologous brain regions. This grounded the mirror system hypothesis of Rizzolatti and Arbib (1998) which offers the mirror system for grasping as a key neural “missing link” between the abilities of our nonhuman ancestors of 20 million years ago and modern human language, with manual gestures rather than a system for vocal communication providing the initial seed for this evolutionary process. The present article, however, goes “beyond the mirror” to offer hypotheses on evolutionary changes within and outside the mirror systems which may have occurred to equip Homo sapiens with a language-ready brain. Crucial to the early stages of this progression is the mirror system for grasping and its extension to permit imitation. Imitation is seen as evolving via a so-called simple system such as that found in chimpanzees (which allows imitation of complex “object-oriented” sequences but only as the result of extensive practice) to a so-called complex system found in humans (which allows rapid imitation even of complex sequences, under appropriate conditions) which supports pantomime. This is hypothesized to have provided the substrate for the development of protosign, a combinatorially open repertoire of manual gestures, which then provides the scaffolding for the emergence of protospeech (which thus owes little to nonhuman vocalizations), with protosign and protospeech then developing in an expanding spiral. It is argued that these stages involve biological evolution of both brain and body. By contrast, it is argued that the progression from protosign and protospeech to languages with full-blown syntax and compositional semantics was a historical phenomenon in the development of Homo sapiens, involving few if any further biological changes.

In this article I evaluate recent attempts to illuminate the human infant cry from an evolutionary perspective. Infants are born into an uncertain parenting environment, which can range from indulgent care of offspring to infanticide. Infant cries are in large part adaptations that maintain proximity to and elicit care from caregivers. Although there is not strong evidence for acoustically distinct cry types, infant cries may function as a graded signal. During pain-induced autonomic nervous system arousal, for example, neural input to the vocal cords increases cry pitch. Caregivers may use this acoustic information, together with other cues, to guide caregiving behavior. Serious pathology, on the other hand, results in chronically and severely abnormal cry acoustics. Such abnormal crying may be a proximate cause of adaptive infant maltreatment, in circumstances in which parents cut their losses and reduce or withdraw investment from infants with low survival chances. An increase in the amount of crying during the first few months of life is a human universal, and excessive crying, or colic, represents the upper end of this normal increase. Potential signal functions of excessive crying include manipulation of parents to acquire additional resources, honest signaling of need, and honest signaling of vigor. Current evidence does not strongly support any one of these hypotheses, but the evidence is most consistent with the hypothesis that excessive early infant crying is a signal of vigor that evolved to reduce the risk of a reduction or withdrawal of parental care.

The strong predominance of right-handedness appears to be a uniquely human characteristic, whereas the left-cerebral dominance for vocalization occurs in many species, including frogs, birds, and mammals. Right-handedness may have arisen because of an association between manual gestures and vocalization in the evolution of language. I argue that language evolved from manual gestures, gradually incorporating vocal elements. The transition may be traced through changes in the function of Broca's area. Its homologue in monkeys has nothing to do with vocal control, but contains the so-called “mirror neurons,” the code for both the production of manual reaching movements and the perception of the same movements performed by others. This system is bilateral in monkeys, but predominantly left-hemispheric in humans, and in humans is involved with vocalization as well as manual actions. There is evidence that Broca's area is enlarged on the left side in Homo habilis, suggesting that a link between gesture and vocalization may go back at least two million years, although other evidence suggests that speech may not have become fully autonomous until Homo sapiens appeared some 170,000 years ago, or perhaps even later. The removal of manual gesture as a necessary component of language may explain the rapid advance of technology, allowing late migrations of Homo sapiens from Africa to replace all other hominids in other parts of the world, including the Neanderthals in Europe and Homo erectus in Asia. Nevertheless, the long association of vocalization with manual gesture left us a legacy of right-handedness.

This study investigated species recognition based on bark calls and full threat calls (FTCs) in three fur seal species, Antarctic Arctocephalus gazella, subantarctic A. tropicalis and New Zealand A. forsteri, that breed sympatrically and hybridize at subantarctic Macquarie Island. Bark calls, which are produced by males in male–female interactions, were more species-specific than their full threat calls, suggesting that bark calls could be used in species recognition and female mate choice. Further, the bark calls of A. tropicalis were more species-specific than those of A. gazella and A. forsteri, suggesting that divergence of calls between species is a consequence of phylogenetic distance, or has resulted from sexual selection through female mate choice. We believe the latter is more probable as we did not observe similar divergence in the FTCs of males. As such, the highly divergent bark calls of A. tropicalis may have resulted from sexual selection that has promoted pre-mating isolation via the process of reinforcement.

Whistle vocalizations of five odontocete cetaceans, the false killer whale P. crassidens, short-finned pilot whale G. macrorhynchus, long-finned pilot whale G. melas, white-beaked dolphin L. albirostris and Risso's dolphin G. griseus, were analysed and summarized quantitatively. Recordings were acquired from a number of locations and encounters. Significant differences were found between species and, to a lesser extent, between locations. The calls of the two pilot whale species are distinct despite their close relatedness, and similar size and morphology. This may be due to selection pressures to maintain distinctiveness. The variance was partitioned into between-species, between-location (within species) and within-location factors. For the frequency variables, variation between-species is high relative to variation between locations. Thus geographic variation is a relatively minor effect, compared to the many processes which cause interspecific differences. The within-location component includes such factors as social context, behaviour and group composition. This component is of a similar magnitude to the between-species component, indicating that whistles vary considerably with these factors. Significant between-location differences may be attributable to these confounding factors. For whistle duration, most of the variation occurred within location. There is less significant variation in duration across species compared with the frequency measures. This study highlights the need to collect samples across all potential strata whenever possible, and provides a framework for future, more comprehensive work.

Vocal signatures and individual recognition are documented in a wide range of avian and mammalian species, but little is known about cervids. However, the existence of individual characteristics in cervid vocalizations is highly probable, as the individual morphology of their vocal organ determines the spectral structure of the uttered signal. Here, we report the presence of individual characteristics in the spectral structure of fallow deer groans recorded during the rutting period. We digitized 147 vocalizations from four adult males and transformed each of them into a power spectrum of 32 values in order to represent the frequency distribution of the sound power. A neural network discrimination with cross validation performed on the resulting variables allowed us correctly to identify 87.9 % of the tested vocalizations. The spectrum characteristics of an individual remained stable over the rutting period, and probably over several consecutive ruts (the vocalizations of one male recorded during a previous rutting period were also correctly classified). We therefore conclude that the groan may constitute a vocal signature. The individually structured groan may provide a valuable basis for individual recognition during the breeding season and therefore may play an important role in the social interactions observed during this period.