Hostname: page-component-89b8bd64d-mmrw7 Total loading time: 0 Render date: 2026-05-07T18:09:45.075Z Has data issue: false hasContentIssue false
  • English
  • Français

The forgotten role of consonant-like calls in theories of speech evolution

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  17 December 2014

Adriano R. Lameira
Adriano R. Lameira*
Affiliation:
Institute for Biodiversity and Ecosystem Dynamics, University of Amsterdam, 1098 XH Amsterdam, the Netherlands. Pongo Foundation, 3421 XN Oudewater, The Netherlands. adriano@orangutan.nl
Get access Rights & Permissions [Opens in a new window]

Abstract

Ackermann et al. provide an informative neurological road-map to primate call communication. However, the proposed model for speech evolution inadequately integrates comparative primate evidence. Critically, great ape voiceless calls are explicitly rendered unimportant, leaving the proposed model deprived of behavioral feedstock and proximate selective drivers capable of triggering the neurological transformations described by the authors in the primate brain.

Information

Type
Open Peer Commentary
Information
Behavioral and Brain Sciences , Volume 37 , Issue 6 , December 2014 , pp. 559 - 560
Copyright
Copyright © Cambridge University Press 2014 

Access options

Get access to the full version of this content by using one of the access options below. (Log in options will check for institutional or personal access. Content may require purchase if you do not have access.)

Article purchase

Temporarily unavailable

References

Arbib, M. A. (2005) From monkey-like action recognition to human language: An evolutionary framework for neurolinguistics. Behavioral and Brain Sciences 28:105–24.Google Scholar
Burkart, J. M., Fehr, E., Efferson, C. & van Schaik, C. P. (2007) Other-regarding preferences in a non-human primate: Common marmosets provision food altruistically. Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences USA 104:19762–66.Google Scholar
Burkart, J. M., Hrdy, S. B. & van Schaik, C. P. (2009a) Cooperative breeding and human cognitive evolution. Evolutionary Anthropology 18:175–86.Google Scholar
Burkart, J. M., Strasser, A. & Foglia, M. (2009b) Trade-offs between social learning and individual innovativeness in common marmosets, Callithrix jacchus . Animal Behaviour 77:1291–301.Google Scholar
Burkart, J. & van Schaik, C. (2010) Cognitive consequences of cooperative breeding in primates? Animal Cognition 13:1–19.Google Scholar
Christiansen, M. H. & Kirby, S. (2003) Language evolution: Consensus and controversies. Trends in Cognitive Sciences 7:300–307.Google Scholar
Clay, Z., Pika, S., Gruber, T. & Zuberbühler, K (2011) Female bonobos use copulation calls as social signals. Biology Letters 7:513–16.Google Scholar
Fitch, W. T., Huber, L. & Bugnyar, T. (2010) Social cognition and the evolution of language: Constructing cognitive phylogenies. Neuron 65(6):795–814. doi: 10.1016/j.neuron.2010.03.011.Google Scholar
Gruber, T. & Zuberbühler, K. (2013) Vocal recruitment for joint travel in wild chimpanzees. PLOS ONE 8:e76073.Google Scholar
Hardus, M. E., Lameira, A. R., van Schaik, C. P. & Wich, S. A. (2009b) Tool use in wild orang-utans modifies sound production: A functionally deceptive innovation? Proceedings of the Royal Society B: Biological Sciences 276:3689–94.Google Scholar
Isler, K. & van Schaik, C. P. (2012) How our ancestors broke through the gray ceiling: Comparative evidence for cooperative breeding in early homo. Current Anthropology 53:S453–65.Google Scholar
Janik, V. & Slater, P. J. B. (1997) Vocal learning in mammals. In: Advances in the Study of Behavior, vol. 26, ed. Slater, P. J. B., Rosenblatt, J. S., Snowdon, C. T., & Milinski, M., pp. 59–99. Academic Press.Google Scholar
Koda, H., Lemasson, A., Oyakawa, C., Rizaldi, P. J. & Masataka, N. (2013) Possible role of mother-daughter vocal interactions on the development of species-specific song in gibbons. PLOS ONE 8:e71432.Google Scholar
Lameira, A. R., Hardus, M. E., Kowalsky, B., de Vries, H., Spruijt, B. M., Sterck, E. H. M., Shumaker, R. W. & Wich, S. A. (2013a) Orangutan (Pongo spp.) whistling and implications for the emergence of an open-ended call repertoire: A replication and extension. Journal of the Acoustical Society of America 134:1–11.Google Scholar
Lameira, A. R., Hardus, M. E., Nouwen, K. J. J. M., Topelberg, E., Delgado, R. A., Spruijt, B. M., Sterck, E. H. M., Knott, C. D. & Wich, S. A. (2013b) Population-specific use of the same tool-assisted alarm call between two wild orangutan populations (Pongopygmaeus wurmbii) indicates functional arbitrariness. PLOS ONE 8:e69749.Google Scholar
Lameira, A., Hardus, M., & Wich, S. (2012) Orangutan instrumental gesture-calls: Reconciling acoustic and gestural speech evolution models. Evolutionary Biology 39:415–18.Google Scholar
Lameira, A. R., Maddieson, I., & Zuberbühler, K. (2013c) Primate feedstock for the evolution of consonants. Trends in Cognitive Science 18:60–62.Google Scholar
Lemasson, A., Ouattara, K., Petic, J. E. & Zuberbühler, K. (2011) Social learning of vocal structure in a nonhuman primate? BMC Evolutionary Biology 11:362. doi:10.1186/1471-2148-11-362.Google Scholar
Maddieson, I. (1984) Patterns of sounds. Cambridge University Press.Google Scholar
Marshall, A. J., Wrangham, R. W. & Arcadi, A. C. (1999) Does learning affect the structure of vocalizations in chimpanzees? Animal Behaviour 58:825–30.Google Scholar
Ouattara, K., Lemasson, A. & Zuberbühler, K. (2009) Campbell's monkeys concatenate vocalizations into context-specific call sequences. Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences USA 106(51): 22026–31.Google Scholar
Schel, A. M., Townsend, S. W., Machanda, Z., Zuberbühler, K. & Slocombe, K. E. (2013) Chimpanzee alarm call production meets key criteria for intentionality. PLOS ONE 8:e76674.Google Scholar
Seyfarth, R. M. (2005) Continuities in vocal communication argue against a gestural origin of language. Behavioral and Brain Sciences 28:144–45.Google Scholar
Seyfarth, R. M. & Cheney, D. L (2003a) Meaning and emotion in animal vocalizations. Annals of the New York Academy of Sciences 1000:32–55.Google Scholar
Seyfarth, R. M. & Cheney, D. L. (2008) Primate social knowledge and the origins of language. Mind and Society 7:129–42.Google Scholar
Seyfarth, R. M. & Cheney, D. L. (2010) Production, usage, and comprehension in animal vocalizations. Brain and Language 115(1):92–100.Google Scholar
Seyfarth, R. M., Cheney, D. L. & Bergman, T. J. (2005) Primate social cognition and the origins of language. Trends in Cognitive Sciences 9:264–66.Google Scholar
Slocombe, K. E. & Zuberbuhler, K. (2007) Chimpanzees modify recruitment screams as a function of audience composition. Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences USA 104:17228–33.Google Scholar
Townsend, S. W., Deschner, T. & Zuberbühler, K. (2008) Female chimpanzees use copulation calls flexibly to prevent social competition. PLOS ONE 3:e2431.Google Scholar
van Schaik, C. P. & Burkart, J. (2010) Mind the gap: Cooperative breeding and the evolution of our unique features. In: Mind gap, ed. Kappeler, P. M. & Silk, J., pp. 477–96. Springer.Google Scholar
Wich, S. A., Krützen, M., Lameira, A. R., Nater, A., Arora, N., Bastian, M. L., Meulman, E., Morrogh-Bernard, H. C., Atmoko, S. S. U., Pamungkas, J., Perwitasari-Farajallah, D., Hardus, M. E., van Noordwijk, M. & van Schaik, C. P. (2012) Call cultures in orang-utans? PLOS ONE 7:e36180.Google Scholar
Wich, S. A., Swartz, K., Hardus, M. E., Lameira, A. R., Stromberg, E. & Shumaker, R. (2009) A case of spontaneous acquisition of a human sound by an orangutan. Primates 50:56–64.Google Scholar