Auditory feedback
in Songbirds
Evren Tumer
This talk will concentrate on the role of auditory feedback in the development and maintenance of song in birds. Many aspects of song learning behavior and the neural substrates of that behavior have been characterized making this an ideal system to study vocal learning and mainetence. Much like human speech development, song birds cannot develop normal songs without hearing the song of adult birds. Also, like humans, birds depend on the ability to hear their own vocalizations in order to maintain normal song. By playing back sounds to the bird during singing the normal auditory feedback of song can be disrupted. In this talk I will discuss the effects manipulating auditory feedback during singing has on song.