Most humans have a sense rhythm (some better than others) but where did we learn how to dance? And are we the only organisms that can? These questions have been posed in the light of a recent study done on birds and their ability to dance.
We have just learned in our Animal Communication class that some song birds have the ability to dance as well as sing in order to attract a mate. These song birds, however, do not have rhythm and cannot dance to songs with a beat. Studies done at Neurosciences Institute in San Diego and Harvard University both confirm that the only type of bird that is capable of having rhythm are birds that have the ability to learn words and mimic sounds- parrots. Two main subjects of these studies are Snowball the Sulfur-crested Cockatoo and Alex the African Grey Parrot. Both of whom are excellent dancers.
Researchers looked at many videos of dancing birds on Youtube and eliminated those that were tampered with in one way or another and focused on the ones that showed real evidence of a parrots ability to detect rhythm. Snowball the cockatoo was tested in a lab setting to determine whether he could pick up beats when music was slowed down or sped up. Sure enough, the Youtube birds appeared to keep a beat and Snowball picked up the new rhythms and danced accordingly.
The researchers involved in this study hypothesize that dancing and rhythm are some how linked to the same part of the brain which aids in vocal learning (as it is in the human brain.) One of the leading researchers also noted that this behavior is a little strange as parrots in the wild are not known to dance to the songs of other birds. Although quite facinating, this study as lead scientists to wonder where this ability to dance came from and what other vocal learning animals might have the ability to dance.
Video link:
http://news.discovery.com/videos/news-birds-keep-the-beat.html
Article:
http://news.nationalgeographic.com/news/2009/04/090430-birds-dance-rhythm.html
Posted by: Meghan Nichols
We have just learned in our Animal Communication class that some song birds have the ability to dance as well as sing in order to attract a mate. These song birds, however, do not have rhythm and cannot dance to songs with a beat. Studies done at Neurosciences Institute in San Diego and Harvard University both confirm that the only type of bird that is capable of having rhythm are birds that have the ability to learn words and mimic sounds- parrots. Two main subjects of these studies are Snowball the Sulfur-crested Cockatoo and Alex the African Grey Parrot. Both of whom are excellent dancers.
Researchers looked at many videos of dancing birds on Youtube and eliminated those that were tampered with in one way or another and focused on the ones that showed real evidence of a parrots ability to detect rhythm. Snowball the cockatoo was tested in a lab setting to determine whether he could pick up beats when music was slowed down or sped up. Sure enough, the Youtube birds appeared to keep a beat and Snowball picked up the new rhythms and danced accordingly.
The researchers involved in this study hypothesize that dancing and rhythm are some how linked to the same part of the brain which aids in vocal learning (as it is in the human brain.) One of the leading researchers also noted that this behavior is a little strange as parrots in the wild are not known to dance to the songs of other birds. Although quite facinating, this study as lead scientists to wonder where this ability to dance came from and what other vocal learning animals might have the ability to dance.
Video link:
http://news.discovery.com/videos/news-birds-keep-the-beat.html
Article:
http://news.nationalgeographic.com/news/2009/04/090430-birds-dance-rhythm.html
Posted by: Meghan Nichols
Maybe parrots do more vocal learning around humans and this increases the stimulation of that part of their brain, allowing them to keep rhythm and dance.
ReplyDeleteI was really happy to read your blog because I was just introduced to the dancing youtube birds a few days ago :) It's really cool!
-Alex Sprague
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ReplyDeleteI wonder if there's a learning curve to dancing? And what determines good dancing? Are there different "moves"? Hard to imagine it being the same as humans.
ReplyDelete- Vince Tieu
I completely agree with Vince's point, I couldn't even imagine seeing a parrot break dance. With this article I wonder if the parrots were conditioned to dance by their owners and then used those rules and knowledge into their own and applied it to different songs. Overall very interesting article.
ReplyDelete-Peter Lucas
This comment has been removed by the author.
ReplyDeleteInteresting article. Could this possibly just be another form of mimicry? Since birds in the wild aren't found to "dance" then this could be an extension of the vocal mimicry behavior that is observered in these species of birds when they are in close contact with humans.
ReplyDelete-Amanda Grafstein
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ReplyDeleteIt is very interesting that parrots are another separate species that can dance to the beat probably because their brain has vocal learning that is similar to ours, and thus may birds and people to dance to rhythm. I wonder what the results would be like if our human's relatives (chimpanzee, gorilla, etc.) respond to music and can dance. It would be interesting definitely to trace back this vocal learning and dancing to the beat through the family trees. Also is there a possibility that wild parrots may dance if exposed to music?
ReplyDeletePosted by Leona Chan
Awesome blog! I've seen parrots dance and since on americas funniest home videos, but I didn't know they could actually recognize a beat and dance to it. These birds are so cute and so smart!
ReplyDelete-Katie Cyr
I wonder what is different in parrots that allows them to dance and sing.
ReplyDeleteAlberto Suarez
Well by dancing I don't necessarily mean a series of steps and practiced moves. I simply mean that they have the ability to detect and head bob or stomp to a rhythm. When the researchers did this study which involved many youtube videos, they eliminated any bird which was given ques or signals for movement to teach them to "dance" or ones which seemed to have had the music added after the behavior was filmed. And although reason for this behavior is not yet well known, it seems that there is a correlation between an animals ability to learn verally and the ability to detect rhythm.
ReplyDeleteAnd yes Leona, it would be intersting to see if other animals have his ability and the scientists who were involved also want to test this with other verbal learners. One researcher said that he would be interested to see if Dolphins also have this ability.
-Meghan
Interesting blog!! You mentioned that scientists have seen that birds that are able to mimic words like parrots are able to dance with a rhythm and these actions are governed by the same region of the brain as the vocal learning is. I wonder if they have actually tested this hypothesis yet to find a correlation between the act of dancing to music with rhythm versus mimicking words. If these two actions turn out to be governed by separate neural circuitry then it might be possible for other birds to dance to rhythm as well, but we just haven't discovered that yet.
ReplyDeleteLoba