Speaker
Description
Birdsong is among the main model system in animal communication. One reason is, next to its accessibility and biological function, the striking variability within and across species. This complexity raises interesting questions on the mechanisms, functions, and evolution of singing traits. Complexity of birdsong occurs at different levels, ranging from the phonological and syntactical structure of songs, the vocal repertoire size, sequential ordering of different syllables and songs to the use of songs in vocal interactions. Here I will address some of the complexities in singing styles across selected species covering examples from classical numerical approaches to quantify complexity to production-quality approaches and more holistic approaches, capturing variation in the more global parameter space. Quantifying the level of complexities at different levels will help understanding the internal processing mechanisms as well as the selection pressures that underly the complexity and eventually its communicative ffunction. By taking different approaches, the presentation highlights different levels of complexity and that simple comparison across individuals and species may not capture the meaningful variation in the respective communication system.
