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Classification of Domestic Cat (Felis catus) Vocalizations by Naive and Experienced Human Listeners
Abstract and Figures
To test for possible functional referentiality in a common domestic cat (Felis catus) vocalization, the authors conducted 2 experiments to examine whether human participants could classify meow sounds recorded from 12 different cats in 5 behavioral contexts. In Experiment 1, participants heard singlecalls, whereas in Experiment 2, bouts of calls were presented. In both cases, classification accuracy was significantly above chance, but modestly so. Accuracy for bouts exceeded that for single calls. Overall, participants performed better in classifying individual calls if they had lived with, interacted with, and had a general affinity for cats. These results provide little evidence of referentiality suggesting instead that meows are nonspecific, somewhat negatively toned stimuli that attract attention from humans. With experience, human listeners can become more proficient at inferring positive-affect states from cat meows.
... The hypothesis of evolutionary homology in vocal emotion expression predicts that listeners should be sensitive to the acoustic cues to the emotional states of conspecific and heterospecific vocalizers alike, depending in part on the phylogenetic distance between the two species and the evolutionary history of the particular vocalization in question (e.g., Fritz et al. (2018); though see Filippi et al. (2017a)). One approach to testing this prediction is to examine human perceptions of emotion from heterospecific vocalizations (Linnankoski et al., 1994;Nicastro & Owren, 2003;Pongrácz et al., 2005;Belin et al., 2008;McComb et al., 2009;Tallet et al., 2010;Faragó et al., 2014;Scheumann et al., 2014;Faragó et al., 2017;Maruščáková et al., 2015;Filippi et al., 2017aFilippi et al., , 2017bKelly et al., 2017;Fritz et al., 2018;Kamilo glu et al., 2020;Merkies, Crouchman & Belliveau, 2021;Massenet et al., 2022). These studies have generally confirmed human sensitivity to emotional information available in heterospecific vocalizations, and thus support Darwin's (1872). ...
... Listeners have tended to base perceptions of emotional arousal in heterospecific vocalizations predominantly on the mean F0 (Nicastro & Owren, 2003;Pongrácz et al., 2005;Faragó et al., 2014Faragó et al., , 2017Maruščáková et al., 2015;Filippi et al., 2017a;Kelly et al., 2017), Other significant acoustic parameters have included vocal duration (Nicastro & Owren, 2003;Faragó et al., 2014Faragó et al., , 2017Maruščáková et al., 2015) and noisiness (Faragó et al., 2014;Filippi et al., 2017b;Massenet et al., 2022). Human listeners appear to show similar perceptual tendencies with regard to the F0 and noisiness of conspecific nonverbal vocalizations (Juslin & Laukka, 2003;Sauter et al., 2010;Faragó et al., 2014;Schwartz & Gouzoules, 2019;Anikin et al., 2021). ...
... Listeners have tended to base perceptions of emotional arousal in heterospecific vocalizations predominantly on the mean F0 (Nicastro & Owren, 2003;Pongrácz et al., 2005;Faragó et al., 2014Faragó et al., , 2017Maruščáková et al., 2015;Filippi et al., 2017a;Kelly et al., 2017), Other significant acoustic parameters have included vocal duration (Nicastro & Owren, 2003;Faragó et al., 2014Faragó et al., , 2017Maruščáková et al., 2015) and noisiness (Faragó et al., 2014;Filippi et al., 2017b;Massenet et al., 2022). Human listeners appear to show similar perceptual tendencies with regard to the F0 and noisiness of conspecific nonverbal vocalizations (Juslin & Laukka, 2003;Sauter et al., 2010;Faragó et al., 2014;Schwartz & Gouzoules, 2019;Anikin et al., 2021). ...
Humans and other mammalian species communicate emotions in ways that reflect evolutionary conservation and continuity, an observation first made by Darwin. One approach to testing this hypothesis has been to assess the capacity to perceive the emotional content of the vocalizations of other species. Using a binary forced choice task, we tested perception of the emotional intensity represented in coos and screams of infant and juvenile female rhesus macaques ( Macaca mulatta ) by 113 human listeners without, and 12 listeners with, experience (as researchers or care technicians) with this species. Each stimulus pair contained one high- and one low-arousal vocalization, as measured at the time of recording by stress hormone levels for coos and the degree of intensity of aggression for screams. For coos as well as screams, both inexperienced and experienced participants accurately identified the high-arousal vocalization at significantly above-chance rates. Experience was associated with significantly greater accuracy with scream stimuli but not coo stimuli, and with a tendency to indicate screams as reflecting greater emotional intensity than coos. Neither measures of empathy, human emotion recognition, nor attitudes toward animal welfare showed any relationship with responses. Participants were sensitive to the fundamental frequency, noisiness, and duration of vocalizations; some of these tendencies likely facilitated accurate perceptions, perhaps due to evolutionary homologies in the physiology of arousal and vocal production between humans and macaques. Overall, our findings support a view of evolutionary continuity in emotional vocal communication. We discuss hypotheses about how distinctive dimensions of human nonverbal communication, like the expansion of scream usage across a range of contexts, might influence perceptions of other species’ vocalizations.
... Indeed, vocalizations are considered as part of animal welfare assessments (Laurijs et al., 2021;Waiblinger et al., 2006). Sharing information with humans is critically important for domesticated animals that depend on them for food, shelter, and protection (Nicastro & Owren, 2003). ...
... While humans appear to be able to distinguish dog vocalizations fairly well, they do not seem to possess the same ability with cats. It is believed that the meow is a product of domestication (Tavernier et al., 2020); nevertheless, humans listening to cat meows produced in different contexts can determine valence but are not successful in distinguishing context (Nicastro & Owren, 2003;Prato-Previde et al., 2020). Cat ownership does improve results, particularly for determining positive valence (Nicastro & Owren, 2003). ...
... It is believed that the meow is a product of domestication (Tavernier et al., 2020); nevertheless, humans listening to cat meows produced in different contexts can determine valence but are not successful in distinguishing context (Nicastro & Owren, 2003;Prato-Previde et al., 2020). Cat ownership does improve results, particularly for determining positive valence (Nicastro & Owren, 2003). Cat purrs recorded during solicitation of a human for food are encoded with a high-frequency component that may be similar to the specific frequency of a human infant's cry and is acoustically different from purrs recorded during non-solicitation events. ...
Horses use whinnies as a communication tool that potentially indicates positive or negative situations reflective of their felt experience. Being able to interpret the emotional state of horses allows humans to respond appropriately to mitigate a negative situation or repeat or enhance a positive situation. This study investigated whether humans can accurately categorize positive and negative whinnies from the domestic horse according to known positive and negative situations validated by behavioral indicators. Using an online survey, participants (n = 309) were asked to categorize 32 horse whinny audio samples based on whether they believed the vocalization was positive or negative and to rate the horse’s arousal level from 1 (calm) to 10 (highly excited). Participants also provided demographic information (age, gender, geographical location, horse experience). Humans were able to correctly categorize the emotional valence of domestic horse vocalizations as positive or negative 64.4% of the time (p < 0.0001). Female participants significantly outperformed male participants (p = 0.0307) in this ability. Age (p = 0.0979), level of horse experience (p = 0.3228), and geographical location (p = 0.0834) did not play a role in an individual’s ability to correctly classify emotional valence, but arousal levels were more likely to be rated higher by older people (p < 0.0001) and females (p = 0.0036) than younger people or males. Positive and negative vocalizations may be indicative of the horse’s emotional state; correct interpretation by humans facilitates an appropriate response to varying situations in training, housing, and husbandry practices.
... This study adhered to the ethical guidelines of Kyoto University, and was approved by the Animal Experiments Committee of the Graduate School of Letters, Kyoto University (No. [17][18][19][20][21][22][23][24][25][26][27][28][29][30][31][32][33][34][35]. Rating procedures adhered to the ethical guidelines of Kyoto University and Bukkyo There were slight differences across testing rooms depending on cats' familiar spaces (house or cat café). ...
... Ethical statement. This study adhered to the ethical guidelines of Kyoto University, and was approved by the Animal Experiments Committee of the Graduate School of Letters, Kyoto University (No. [17][18][19][20][21][22][23][24][25][26][27][28][29][30][31][32][33][34][35]. Rating procedures adhered to the ethical guidelines of Kyoto University and Bukkyo University. ...
... First, the isolation calls were probably more emotional in content than the voices calling subjects' names in Exp.1, eliciting a response that could override any response toward the impossible teleportation. Second, adult cats do not direct "meow" to conspecifics [32]; they only use it when requesting something from a human ( [34] as cited in [35]). It is possible that they did not in fact recognize the cat they heard meowing. ...
Many animals probably hold mental representations about the whereabouts of others; this is a form of socio-spatial cognition. We tested whether cats mentally map the spatial position of their owner or a familiar cat to the source of the owner’s or familiar cat’s vocalization. In Experiment 1, we placed one speaker outside a familiar room (speaker 1) and another (speaker 2) inside the room, as far as possible from speaker 1, then we left the subject alone in the room. In the habituation phase, the cat heard its owner’s voice calling its name five times from speaker 1. In the test phase, shortly after the 5 th habituation phase vocalization, one of the two speakers played either the owner’s voice or a stranger’s voice calling the cat’s name once. There were four test combinations of speaker location and sound: Same sound Same location , Same sound Diff location , Diff sound Same location , Diff sound Diff location . In line with our prediction, cats showed most surprise in the Same sound Diff location condition, where the owner suddenly seemed to be in a new place. This reaction disappeared when we used cat vocalizations (Experiment 2) or non-vocal sounds (Experiment 3) as the auditory stimuli. Our results suggest that cats have mental representations about their out-of-sight owner linked to hearing the owner’s voice, indicating a previously unidentified socio-spatial cognitive ability.
... Although research on domestic cat behavior and cognition is growing [37], cat cognitive and communicative skills have been far less investigated than those of dogs, and the literature on the cat-human relationship and communication is more sparse and limited [10,38]. Only a handful of studies have investigated cat vocalizations and the characteristics of cat-human communication [39][40][41][42][43] and little is known about the human ability to recognize and classify the context and the possible emotional content of cat-to-human vocalizations [44][45][46]. However, understanding the extent of the effectiveness of the reciprocal communication between cats and humans is not only theoretically interesting but also relevant for cat welfare, since cats, like dogs, live in close contact with their human social partners and depend on them for health, care, and affection. ...
... Despite the fact that various studies showed that humans can correctly classify the vocalizations of different species according to their context of emission and emotional content (e.g., chimpanzees [51], pigs [52], dogs [53], and cats [44]), meows have been largely overlooked, and the few available studies have produced contrasting results [41,44,46,54]. ...
... Despite the fact that various studies showed that humans can correctly classify the vocalizations of different species according to their context of emission and emotional content (e.g., chimpanzees [51], pigs [52], dogs [53], and cats [44]), meows have been largely overlooked, and the few available studies have produced contrasting results [41,44,46,54]. ...
Simple Summary: Cat-human communication is a core aspect of cat-human relationships and has an impact on domestic cats' welfare. Meows are the most common human-directed vocalizations and are used in different everyday contexts to convey emotional states. This work investigates adult humans' capacity to recognize meows emitted by cats during waiting for food, isolation, and brushing. We also assessed whether participants' gender and level of empathy toward animals in general, and toward cats in particular, positively affect the recognition of cat meows. Participants were asked to complete an online questionnaire designed to assess their knowledge of cats and to evaluate their empathy toward animals. In addition, they listened to cat meows recorded in different situations and tried to identify the context in which they were emitted and their emotional valence. Overall, we found that, although meowing is mainly a human-directed vocalization and should represent a useful tool for cats to communicate emotional states to their owners, humans are not good at extracting precise information from cats' vocalizations and show a limited capacity of discrimination based mainly on their experience with cats and influenced by gender and empathy toward them. Abstract: Although the domestic cat (Felis catus) is probably the most widespread companion animal in the world and interacts in a complex and multifaceted way with humans, the human-cat relationship and reciprocal communication have received far less attention compared, for example, to the human-dog relationship. Only a limited number of studies have considered what people understand of cats' human-directed vocal signals during daily cat-owner interactions. The aim of the current study was to investigate to what extent adult humans recognize cat vocalizations, namely meows, emitted in three different contexts: waiting for food, isolation, and brushing. A second aim was to evaluate whether the level of human empathy toward animals and cats and the participant's gender would positively influence the recognition of cat vocalizations. Finally, some insights on which acoustic features are relevant for the main investigation are provided as a serendipitous result. Two hundred twenty-five adult participants were asked to complete an online questionnaire designed to assess their knowledge of cats and to evaluate their empathy toward animals (Animal Empathy Scale). In addition, participants had to listen to six cat meows recorded in three different contexts and specify the context in which they were emitted and their emotional valence. Less than half of the participants were able to associate cats' vocalizations with the correct context in which they were emitted; the best recognized meow was that emitted while waiting for food. Female participants and cat owners showed a higher ability to correctly classify the vocalizations emitted by cats during brushing and isolation. A high level of empathy toward cats was significantly associated with a better recognition of meows emitted during isolation. Regarding the emotional valence of meows, it emerged that cat vocalizations emitted during isolation are perceived by people as the most negative, whereas those emitted during brushing are perceived as most positive. Overall, it emerged that, although meowing is mainly a human-directed vocalization and in principle represents a useful tool for cats to communicate emotional states to their owners, humans are not particularly able to extract precise information from cats' vocalizations and show a limited capacity of discrimination based mainly on their experience with cats and influenced by empathy toward them.
... Open and closed gradually [5,7,12,15,29,30,31,36,41,49] Moan Long, often slowly frequency-modulated vowel sounds or "o" or "u" When something is desired + [8] (continued to the next page) P r o v i s i o n a l P r o v i s i o n a l (filter) [7]. However, in the case of the cat, researchers have defined behaviors considered "voiceless" (chatter, hiss, and spits) as vocalization [8,9]. ...
... It could refer to a "meow" as well as any other kind of vocalization. Thus, calls can have various functions as it could serve to express a state resulting from a general motivation stage but is specific to an emitter-perceiver couple [2,31]. ...
... The hiss is a long exhalation produced by the cat while its mouth is open with the teeth exposed [31,35]. The vocalization is voiceless, involuntary and triggered by the surprise appearance of an enemy. ...
Cat vocalizes to communicate with another and express their internal states. The vocal repertoire of the cat is wide and up to 21 different vocalizations have been described in the literatures. But it is more than probable that the repertoire contains more types of vocalizations. An ethogram was created in this paper describing the actual known vocalisations of the domestic cat based on an auditory classification. However, the audiogram allows also a visual classification which can increase the accuracy of vocalization differentiation. The classification can be risky as it is sometimes unclear if different types of vocalizations are produced in different environments or if a unique type of vocalization is used with variation in the acoustic parameters. As an example, isolation calls produced by kittens differ depending on the context. The environment has an important impact on the vocal behaviour and thus feral cats and pet cats vocalize differently. Pet cats are thus able to create an efficient communication with humans thanks to the flexibility of vocalisation behaviours. This review allowed us to create a simple model of the cat vocal repertory.
... Although most studies of domestic cat vocalisations have been carried out by nonlinguists (e.g. Brown et al. 1978;Nicastro and Owren 2003;Yeon et al. 2011;Owens et al. 2017), investigations with phonetic methods may increase our knowledge of the different sound types. The variation in the articulatory, acoustic and perceptual features may be related to different mental states and behavioural contexts. ...
... Towards the end of the vocalisation, the mouth usually closes again, occasionally resulting in an additional consonant sound, often a [w]. Meows are voiced-and generally quite loudsounds with varying intonation, typically with an arched (rising-falling, with the peak corresponding to the maximum mouth opening) intonation (Nicastro and Owren 2003), but several other tonal patterns-including level, rising, falling and falling-rising-have also been observed. The duration may vary substantially, but usually ranges between 0.5 and 1.5 seconds. ...
... As previously mentioned, every human-cat pair seems to develop a unique communicative code and learns to relate a certain sound or tone of voice to a specific intention, need or desire. However, a number of studies have suggested that humans only perform modestly better than chance when given the task to judge cat meows from different behavioural contexts (Nicastro and Owren 2003;Schötz and van de Weijer 2014). Although cat vocalisations seem to attract the attention of humans, some experience is needed to be able to correctly interpret the context where the sound was uttered. ...
This book provides an up-to-date overview of the current knowledge and research concerning domestic pets as sentinels, forecasters and promoters of human health. Written by leading specialists in the fields of medicine, veterinary, environment, analytical chemistry, sociology and behavioral science, this volume provides a comprehensive understanding of the capabilities of pets in what regards to human health. The first seven chapters are devoted to the use of pets as sentinels for their human companions, in terms of exposure to different classes of environmental chemicals. The following five chapters address the use of pets as models for human diseases and promoters of human health. The final two chapters highlight the psycho-social and psychophysiological aspects of human-animal interactions.
The book offers an integrated approach to the One Health concept, providing, in a truly holistic manner, tools to assess the equilibrium between the environment, men and animals. This exercise will highlight and reshape our position towards the planet that despite being “a microscopic dot on a microscopic dot lost in the unimaginable infinity of the Universe” is still our own. At the end of the day, pets will always be there to help us.
... However, beyond the dramatic, widely recognised signals of cats under threat (the fully retracted ears, hissing open mouths and piloerection so welldescribed by Darwin [1998] and Leyhausen [1979]), how well humans can read cats, in contrast, has been little researched, attracting just four peer-reviewed studies to date. Three investigated vocalisations, showing that people have limited abilities to correctly match recorded 'meows' to the contexts or states of unfamiliar cats (though some raters are successful, especially for familiar cats) (Nicastro & Owren 2003;Belin et al 2008; Ellis et al 2015; Table S1 [https://www.ufaw.org.uk/the-ufaw-journal/supplementarymaterial]). The fourth focused on facial expressions (Holden et al 2014): Veterinarians and veterinary nurses asked to distinguish between still images of the faces of painful and pain-free cats were often incorrect. ...
... We also sought to determine whether such abilities extend to positive states. As well as testing these hypotheses, we also aimed to identify how various rater characteristics, such as gender and experience with cats, influence raters' abilities to identify feline affective states: such factors often prove important in similar research on dogs ( Wan et al 2012;Schirmer et al 2013;Flint et al 2018), and the few cat studies to date already suggest large individual differences between people (Nicastro & Owren 2003;Holden et al 2014). ...
... Thus, abilities to read cat faces were not improved by having ever lived with a cat, the number of years spent living with cats, nor by their current number of owned cats. At first sight surprising, this does resemble previous findings for cat vocalisations: in one study, personal involvement with cats did not help people correctly identify the valence of bouts of recorded meows, though it did with single meows (Nicastro & Owren 2003); while in the other, cat owners could only reliably interpret the context of their own cat's meows, but not those of unknown cats (Ellis et al 2015). Likewise, several studies find that dog ownership does not improve peoples' abilities to interpret canine emotions: thus, it did not improve abilities to describe canine behaviour (in videos of dog-dog interactions) (Tami & Gallagher 2009), nor to recognise affect from still images of dog faces (Schirmer et al 2013); with one study even finding that dog ownership can reduce abilities to identify canine fear and anxiety (Demirbas et al 2016). ...
Although cats' popularity as pets rivals that of dogs, cats are little studied, and people's abilities to read this apparently 'inscrutable' species have attracted negligible research. To determine whether people can identify feline emotions from cats' faces, participants (n = 6,329) each viewed 20 video clips of cats in carefully operationalised positively (n = 10) or negatively valenced states (n = 10) (cross-factored with low and high activity levels). Obvious cues (eg open mouths or fully retracted ears) were eliminated. Participants' average scores were low (11.85/20 correct), but overall above chance; furthermore, 13% of participants were individually significantly successful at identifying the valence of cats' states (scoring ≥ 15/20 correct). Women were more successful at this task than men, and younger participants more successful than older, as were participants with professional feline (eg veterinary) experience. In contrast, personal contact with cats (eg pet-owning) had little effect. Cats in positive states were most likely to be correctly identified, particularly if active rather than inactive. People can thus infer cats' affective states from subtle aspects of their facial expressions (although most find this challenging); and some individuals are very good at doing so. Understanding where such abilities come from, and precisely how cats' expressions change with affective state, could potentially help pet owners, animal care staff and veterinarians optimise feline care and welfare.
... A similar domestication effect is also evident for cats: miaowing is not observed in adult wild cats and is a signal directly aimed at humans [16]. However, counter to findings for dog barks, human listeners seem to be relatively poor at categorizing cat miaows (scoring just above chance when categorizing unfamiliar cats [17,18]). In both studies, experience with cats was associated with improved accuracy. ...
... We found that cat-owners perceived the cat miaows more negatively than other participants. This finding is broadly in line with work showing that cat ownership improves sensitivity to cat miaows [17,18]. The effect was highly specific to the cat sounds: cat-owners did not rate other sounds more negatively, suggesting that they are not simply more sensitive to negative emotion than non-cat-owners. ...
... Additionally, we chose to look at cat miaows because they are the most common cat-to-human vocalization [46]. While miaows are a cat's primary vocal communicator of distress, they also occur in other contexts, such as when cats are soliciting affection from their owners [17]. Dog whines, in contrast, arguably indicate distress more exclusively. ...
Pets have numerous, effective methods to communicate with their human hosts. Perhaps most conspicuous of these are distress vocalizations: in cats, the 'miaow' and in dogs, the 'whine' or 'whimper'. We compared a sample of young adults who owned cats and or dogs ('pet-owners' n = 264) and who did not (n = 297) on their ratings of the valence of animal distress vocalizations, taken from a standardized database of sounds. We also examined these participants' self-reported symptoms of anxiety and depression, and their scores on a measure of interpersonal relationship functioning. Pet-owners rated the animal distress vocalizations as sadder than adults who did not own a pet. Cat-owners specifically gave the most negative ratings of cat miaows compared with other participants, but were no different in their ratings of other sounds. Dog sounds were rated more negatively overall, in fact as negatively as human baby cries. Pet-owning adults (cat only, dog only, both) were not significantly different from adults with no pets on symptoms of depression, anxiety or on self-reported interpersonal relationship functioning. We suggest that pet ownership is associated with greater sensitivity to negative emotion in cat and dog distress vocalizations.
... The majority of cat owners responding to our questionnaire agreed that it is not easy to assess a cat's inner state. It was found earlier that cat owners had difficulties in guessing the contextual information of cat meows, apart from a general judgement that the cat 'wants something' (Nicastro and Owren, 2003). The same authors reported that cat owners who had extended experience and a more intense attraction to their pets were more successful in assessing cat vocalizations. ...
... Regarding the 'Cat vocalizes' trait, according to the owners, cats always vocalized if they wanted something (e.g. when the cat is hungry or wants to go out). These results are in line with earlier results, where human listeners found cats' meowing without context or inner-state specificity (Nicastro and Owren, 2003). At the same time cats' meowing shows acoustic resemblance to a baby's cry, consequently it is very hard to ignore (Brewster et al., 1998;Hechler et al., 2015;Lawrence, 2003). ...
... While dog vocalizations are highly informative for humans (e.g. Molnár et al., 2010;Pongrácz et al., 2011Pongrácz et al., , 2017, cat vocalizations were considered by the owners as mere expressions of the cats' intention to 'get something'a result that is similar to the earlier playback study done by Nicastro and Owren (2003). Although there are indications of the personality differences between cat and dog owners (Gosling et al., 2010), our and others findings regarding the lack of complex meaning of cat vocalizations for humans, might be one of the reasons why cats are considered as being capable of expressing less emotions than dogs (Arahori et al., 2017). ...
Although domestic cats are among the most common companion animals, we still know very little about the details of the cat-human relationship. With a questionnaire, we asked 157 Hungarian cat owners about their pet's behavior, cognitive abilities and social interactions. We analyzed the responses with PCA resulting in 11 traits. The effect of cats’ and owners’ demographic variables on the main components was further analyzed with GLM. The results showed strong similarity to the surveys performed with companion dogs, but we also found features that were mainly cat-specific. We found that women considered their cats to be more communicative and empathetic, than men did (p = 0.000). The higher education owners also considered their cat as being more communicative and empathetic (p = 0.000). We also found that owners use pointing signals more often if the cat is their only pet (p = 0.000), and otherwise they do not give verbal commands often to the cat (P = 0.001). Young owners imitated cat vocalization more often (p = 0.006); while emotional matching of the cat was more commonly reported by elderly owners (p = 0.001). The more an owner initiated playing with his/her cat, the imitation of cat vocalizations was also more common in his/her case (p = 0.001). Owners think that their cat shows stronger emotional matching if otherwise they experience human-like communicative capacity from the cat (p = 0.000). Owners use more pointing signals in the case of those cats that show attention-eliciting signals in more than one modality (p = 0.000). Owners who react to the meows of unfamiliar cats, initiated interactions more often with their own cats (p = 0.000). Owners also think that cats vocalize in every possible context, and this result was not affected significantly by any of the independent factors. Our results show that owners considered their cat as a family member, and they attributed well developed socio-cognitive skills to them. Because cats have an important role as a companion animal, it would be worthy to study cat behavior with similar thoroughness as with dogs. Our questionnaire may provide a good starting point for the empirical research of cat-human communication. The deeper understanding of cats’ socio-cognitive abilities may also help to improve cat welfare.
... Nicastro and owren recorded meow vocalisations of cats that were placed in the unfamiliar environment of a car and taken on a short journey. 8 While the context was designed to induce fear, the behaviour and body language descriptions of these cats, as well as the physical confinement associated with the car, might suggest that some could also have been experiencing frustration; thus it is difficult to know which emotional system the vocalisations related to or whether they reflected a combination of both fear and frustration. in an open field test, developed as a laboratory model of fear and anxiety, fearful cats were generally quiet, while non-fearful and mildly fearful cats displayed significantly higher frequencies of vocalisation, 9 suggesting that vocalisations may be more likely to be a common feature of frustration, although variability between cats and contexts in terms of how the meow sounds is likely to be considerable. ...
... in an open field test, developed as a laboratory model of fear and anxiety, fearful cats were generally quiet, while non-fearful and mildly fearful cats displayed significantly higher frequencies of vocalisation, 9 suggesting that vocalisations may be more likely to be a common feature of frustration, although variability between cats and contexts in terms of how the meow sounds is likely to be considerable. 8,10 Behaviour, body language, posture and facial expressions should all be read together holistically, alongside contextual information, before a hypothesis is formed on what emotional motivation(s) the cat may be experiencing. ...
... With the freezing response comes the inhibition of a number of behaviours; for example, urination, defecation, eating, playing, exploration and grooming. 8 Some inhibition of behaviour occurs temporarily rather than there being a complete cessation; for example, cats hospitalised in veterinary clinics will often not eat, drink or eliminate during the day when people are frequently present. 13 However, overnight when the clinic is quieter, the cats often perform these behaviours. ...
Practical relevance
Crucial to successful treatment of problem behaviour and optimising the welfare of the individual cat is determining which underpinning emotion(s) are involved in the presentation of the behaviour. Feline emotions are not feelings per se, but motivational-emotional systems that are responsible for instinctual emotional arousal. Often different interventions are required to alleviate different negative emotional motivations.
Clinical challenges
Identifying different emotional motivations and the arousal level associated with them solely from observations of behaviour and body language is a difficult task because, as with any species, the behavioural repertoire of the domestic cat is finite and the same behaviour may occur with the activation of different emotional systems. In addition, cats, like people, may experience more than one emotion at the same time or switch quickly between emotional motivations, and this further complicates identification. The behavioural assessment of pain is also notoriously difficult in cats.
Evidence base
This review draws on the published literature where available and, where there is a paucity of research, on hypotheses derived from observations of professionals in the field.
Global importance
Being able to recognise and assess feline emotional motivations in order to address problem behaviours and improve welfare is important for all veterinarians who see cats.
... Only a few studies to date have tested human listeners' perception of behavioural contexts from heterospecific vocalizations. The results have shown that listeners can correctly classify the production context of dogs' barks [17], cats' meows [18] and the vocalizations of pigs [13]. However, previous studies are limited to domesticated animals that are distantly related to humans. ...
... In studies comparing animal vocalizations produced in positive and negative contexts, humans have consistently been found to be better at identifying affective information produced in negative contexts [8,13,18,19]. For instance, listeners correctly identified arousal levels in silver fox vocalizations only when they were produced in negative contexts [8]. ...
Vocalizations linked to emotional states are partly conserved among phylogenetically related species. This continuity may allow humans to accurately infer affective information from vocalizations produced by chimpanzees. In two pre-registered experiments, we examine human listeners' ability to infer behavioural contexts (e.g. discovering food) and core affect dimensions (arousal and valence) from 155 vocalizations produced by 66 chimpanzees in 10 different positive and negative contexts at high, medium or low arousal levels. In experiment 1, listeners (n = 310), categorized the vocalizations in a forced-choice task with 10 response options, and rated arousal and valence. In experiment 2, participants (n = 3120) matched vocalizations to production contexts using yes/no response options. The results show that listeners were accurate at matching vocalizations of most contexts in addition to inferring arousal and valence. Judgments were more accurate for negative as compared to positive vocalizations. An acoustic analysis demonstrated that, listeners made use of brightness and duration cues, and relied on noisiness in making context judgements, and pitch to infer core affect dimensions. Overall, the results suggest that human listeners can infer affective information from chimpanzee vocalizations beyond core affect, indicating phylogenetic continuity in the mapping of vocalizations to behavioural contexts.
... Хотя домашние животные принадлежат к разным систематическим группам, изменчивость многих признаков у них носит гомологический характер (Беляев, 1981, 1983; Беляев, Трут, 1989). Возможность изменений в вокальном поведении при доместикации обсуждалась для домашних собак Canis familiaris (Cohen, Fox, 1976;Pongrácz et al., 2005Pongrácz et al., , 2006Molnár et al., 2006), морских свинок Cavia aperea (Monticelli, Ades, 2011), домашних кошек Felis catus (Nicastro, Owren, 2003;Nicastro, 2004;McComb et al., 2009). Одним из самых ярких примеров изменения вокального поведения у доместицированного животного может служить гипертрофированное использование лая домашними собаками Canis familiaris по сравнению с волком Canis lupus (Yin, McCowan, 2004;Чулкина и др., 2006;Lord et al., 2009). ...
... Коэна и М. Фокса (Cohen, Fox, 1976), что в процессе доместикации домашней собаки был снят блок «на молчаливость», который присутствует у диких псовых для того, чтобы не привлекать хищников и не отпугивать потенциальную добычу. Другая гипотеза, предложенная Н. Никастро и М. Оуреном (Nicastro, Owren, 2003), предполагает, что возрастание доли вокальной активности в процессе доместикации -это результат неявного отбора, осуществляемого человеком, который проявлял бóльшую заботу о более активно вокализирующих животных. ...
This paper systematizes and generalizes a research cycle devoted to studying the acoustics and vocal behaviour of silver foxes that differ in their tolerance to humans. The research revealed that 50-year selection for tameness toward people resulted in selective use by Tame foxes toward humans of two call types, pant and cackle. At the same time, the selected for aggression toward people Aggressive foxes and the non-selected for behaviour Control foxes, selectively use toward humans cough and snort. Thus, call types representing vocal indicators of friendly and aggressive behaviour of foxes toward humans have been revealed by the research. Nevertheless, experimental domestication did not change vocal behaviour of foxes toward conspecifics; all three strains did not differ by their vocal behaviour toward same-strain silver foxes. Relationship has been investigated between vocal behaviour and degree of tolerance toward people for hybrids between Tame and Aggressive foxes and for backcrosses to Tame and Aggressive foxes. Effect was estimated between fox sex and the degree of human impact on focal fox for variables of fox vocal behaviour. The research revealed the universal for mammals vocal indicators of emotional arousal that are independent of the emotional valence. Characteristics of vocal behaviour that are related with positive and negative emotional valence have been revealed. A simple and effective method for estimating animal discomfort based on "joint calls" that takes into account the characteristics of all calls irrespective of their acoustic structure has been revealed. The obtained results provide a basis for further comparative studies of the acoustic structure and vocal behaviour for other taxa of the genus Vulpes and the related canid genera (Canis, Cuon, Lycaon).
... Faragó [28] showed that humans rate human and dog vocalizations with shorter duration, and human vocalizations with lower spectral centre of gravity (hereafter SCG), as more positive (but see [29]). Moreover, humans can correctly classify the emotional content of vocalizations produced by human infants, chimpanzees (Pan troglodytes) [33], domestic pigs (Sus scrofa domesticus) [27,34], dogs (Canis familiaris) [33,35] and cats (Felis catus) [30,36], based on vocal production contexts varying in emotional dimensions (e.g. agonistic or food-related contexts [37]). ...
... We cannot exclude that, besides the acoustic parameters included in our statistical model, amplitude might also play a role in the human ability to discriminate levels of arousal. Ever since Darwin argued for a shared set of mechanisms grounding vocal emotional expression across terrestrial vertebrates [12,39], there have been attempts to pinpoint the phylogenetic continuity of emotional communication across species, in terms of both the production [13][14][15][16][17][18][19][20][21][22][23][24][49][50][51][52][53] and the perception [25][26][27][28][29][30][31][32][33][34][35][36][37][38] of emotional vocalizations. However, no study had investigated the ability of humans to recognize emotional information in vocalizations of non-mammalian species. ...
Writing over a century ago, Darwin hypothesized that vocal expression of emotion dates back to our earliest terrestrial ancestors. If this hypothesis is true, we should expect to find cross-species acoustic universals in emotional vocalizations. Studies suggest that acoustic attributes of aroused vocalizations are shared across many mammalian species, and that humans can use these attributes to infer emotional content. But do these acoustic attributes extend to non-mammalian vertebrates? In this study, we asked human participants to judge the emotional content of vocalizations of nine vertebrate species representing three different biological classes—Amphibia, Reptilia (non-aves and aves) and Mammalia. We found that humans are able to identify higher levels of arousal in vocalizations across all species. This result was consistent across different language groups (English, German and Mandarin native speakers), suggesting that this ability is biologically rooted in humans. Our findings indicate that h
... Furthermore, studies on arousal perception across species suggests that shepherds' high-pitched, quickly pulsating whistles have an activating effect on dogs (McConnell and Baylis, 2010) and that 2 species of deers Odocoileus hemionus and Odocoileus virginianus respond to infant distress vocalizations of human and nonhuman animals (infant marmots Marmota flaviventris, seals Neophoca cinerea, and Arctocephalus tropicalis, domestic cats Felis catus, bats Lasionycteris noctivagans, humans H. sapiens, and other ungulates: eland Taurotragus oryx, red deer Cervus elaphus, fallow deer Dama dama, sika deer Cers nippon, pronghorn Antilocapridae americana, and bighorn sheep Ovis canadensis) if the F0 falls within the deer's frequency response range (Lingle and Riede 2014). Moreover, research on valence perception suggests that humans recognize the negative and positive contexts in which vocalizations of human infants H. sapiens, chimpanzees Pan troglodytes (Scheumann et al. 2014), domestic pigs Sus scrofa domesticus (Tallet et al. 2010;Maru s c akov a et al. 2015), dogs Canis familiaris (Pongr acz et al. 2006;Scheumann et al. 2014), and cats F. catus (Nicastro and Owren 2003) were recorded (but see Belin et al. 2008 for contrasting results on human perception of valence in cats F. catus-and monkeys Macaca mulatta vocalizations). Albuquerque et al. (2016) found that dogs can identify emotional valence in both conspecific and human vocalizations. ...
... Our findings are consistent with previous research showing that humans are able to perceive arousal in vocalizations of cats (Nicastro and Owren 2003;McComb et al. 2009), dogs (Pongr acz et al. 2005Farag o et al. 2014;Albuquerque et al. 2016), and piglets (Tallet et al. 2010;Maru s c akov a et al. 2015). Our results confirm findings from Filippi et al. (2016), suggesting that humans are able to recognize arousal in vocalizations emitted by members of species varying in size, social structure, and ecology. ...
The ability to identify emotional arousal in heterospecific vocalizations may facilitate behaviors that increase survival opportunities. Crucially, this ability may orient inter-species interactions, particularly between humans and other species. Research shows that humans identify emotional arousal in vocalizations across multiple species, such as cats, dogs and piglets. However, no previous study has addressed humans’ ability to identify emotional arousal in silver foxes. Here, we adopted low and high arousal calls emitted by three strains of silver fox - Tame, Aggressive and Unselected - in response to human approach. Tame and Aggressive foxes are genetically selected for friendly and attacking behaviors toward humans, respectively. Unselected foxes show aggressive and fearful behaviors toward humans. These three strains show similar levels of emotional arousal, but different levels of emotional valence in relation to humans. This emotional information is reflected in the acoustic features of the calls. Our data suggest that humans can identify high arousal calls of Aggressive and Unselected foxes, but not of Tame foxes. Further analyses revealed that, although within each strain different acoustic parameters affect human accuracy in identifying high arousal calls, spectral center of gravity, harmonic-to-noise ratio and F0 predict humans’ ability to discriminate high arousal calls and that spectral center of gravity across all strains. Furthermore, we identified in spectral center of gravity and fundamental frequency the best predictors for humans’ absolute ratings of arousal in each call. Implications for research on the adaptive value of interspecific eavesdropping are discussed.
... While the bark represents the most characteristic vocalization of canids [29][30][31][32][33][34][35][36], the meow represents the most characteristic vocalization of felids, either wild [37][38][39] or domesticated [38][39][40][41][42][43]. Consistently, the meow represents a prominent vocalization in their vocal repertoire of the cheetah [18,19,26]. ...
... The regular use of meows for cheetah-human interactions may indicate manipulating the keeper behaviour by the animals. Similarly, domestic cats use meows for manipulating their owners [38,40,41]. Consistently, domestic dogs (Canis familiaris) exposed to insoluble tasks, appeal for help to humans, staring on them and producing specific movements [66] and frustrative whining vocalizations [67]. ...
The vocal repertoire of captive cheetahs (Acinonyx jubatus) and the specific role of meow vocalizations in communication of this species attract research interest about two dozen years. Here, we expand this research focus for the contextual use of call types, sex differences and individual differences at short and long terms. During 457 trials of acoustic recordings, we collected calls (n = 8120) and data on their contextual use for 13 adult cheetahs (6 males and 7 females) in four Russian zoos. The cheetah vocal repertoire comprised 7 call types produced in 8 behavioural contexts. Context-specific call types (chirr, growl, howl and hiss) were related to courting behaviour (chirr) or to aggressive behaviour (growl, howl and hiss). Other call types (chirp, purr and meow) were not context-specific. The values of acoustic variables differed between call types. The meow was the most often call type. Discriminant function analysis revealed a high potential of meows to encode individual identity and sex at short terms, however, the vocal individuality was unstable over years. We discuss the contextual use and acoustic variables of call types, the ratios of individual and sex differences in calls and the pathways of vocal ontogeny in the cheetah with relevant data on vocalization of other animals.
... For comparison with our data, adult domestic house cats trained to meow for a reward produced meows of 0.61 ± 0.24 s, with average (Farley et al., 1992). Meows of 12 adult house cats, averaged across 5 behavioural contexts, had duration of 0.78 ± 0.45 s and maximum fundamental frequency of 0.77 ± 0.19 kHz (Nicastro & Owren, 2003). Meows of 74 cats (29 males and 45 females) recorded in two situations: aversive (the cat in a transport box in a moving car) and pleasant (delicious food offered to the cat) had a duration from 0.62 to 1.02 s and f 0,mean from 0.50 to 0.59 kHz (Schnaider et al., 2022). ...
This study investigates the frequency, temporal and power parameters in 11 (5 males, 6 females) captive feral domestic cats Felis silvestris catus, vocalising in their individual outdoor enclosures during the mating season. Discriminant function analysis (DFA) classified the meows to correct callers with 79.2% accuracy, which exceeded the chance level of 22.9 ± 2.8%, calculated with permutation test. Male meows were lower-frequency, with the maximum fundamental frequency of 0.37 ± 0.05 kHz vs 0.61 ± 0.16 kHz in females. Sex differences in the maximum, beginning and end fundamental frequencies varied from 32 to 39%, depending on acoustic parameter. The DFA classified the meows to correct sex with accuracy of 88.0%, which exceeded the chance level of 58.2 ± 3.1%. We discuss that the meows encode information about individual identity and sex and that acoustic differences in frequency parameters of the meows exceed sexual dimorphism of body size in domestic cat.
... kHz (Urrutia et al., 2022); differences in these data were probably related to the differences in the recording contexts. The meows of adult domestic cats, recorded in various contexts, ranged from 0.50 to 0.88 kHz in f0max and from 0.60 to 1.02 s in duration (Farley et al., 1992;Nicastro, 2004;Nicastro & Owren, 2003;Schnaider et al., 2022;Sedova et al., 2023;Yeon et al., 2011). Adult feral domestic cats produced the meows with f0max of 0.40 kHz and a prolonged duration of 1.7-1.8 ...
Wild cheetahs Acinonyx jubatus of all age classes, from newborns to adults, use their long-distance chirps for communication with conspecifics. We investigated the ontogenetic changes of eight acoustic parameters of the chirps produced by wild-living cheetahs across 14 age classes in Kenya. Chirp maximum fundamental frequency (f0max) was found to be best acoustic correlate of cheetah age. The f0max was the highest in neonates (up to 10 kHz), then decreased steadily across age classes and reached a plateau of about 1 kHz in mature adults older than 4 years. Based on a close relationship of f0max with age, we fitted polynomial models for estimating cheetah age by their chirps. We discuss that gradual changes of chirp f0max suggest the gradual development of cheetah vocal apparatus. Model for age estimation by chirps in the cheetah proposed in this study may provide conservationists a non-invasive bioacoustic tool for estimating cheetah age, particularly at ages younger than 4 years. However, introducing more data from cheetahs of precisely known age would be necessary for obtaining more accurate results of age determination by voice for the older individuals.
... The features of human-cat relationship and communication have been investigated highlighting the influence of both ontogenetic and evolutionary factors (e.g., biological predisposition and temperament) on cat social abilities 4-6 . Cats efficiently engage in interspecific communication as they display specific signals directed towards humans (facial expressions 7 and vocalizations 8,9 ) and are capable of recognizing the information content of human cues 10-12 . Several studies demonstrate that cats are able to follow human gestures to locate hidden food (pointing 10 and gazing 11 ) and are sensitive to human ostensive cues and attentional states 11-14 . ...
Cat social behaviour and cognition has received a growing interest during the last decades. Recent studies reported that cats efficiently engage in interspecific communication with humans and suggest that cats are sensitive to human emotional visual and auditory cues. To date, there is no evidence on the social and informative role of human emotional odours, which may affect human-cat communication. In this study, we presented cats with human odours collected in different emotional contexts (fear, happiness, physical stress and neutral) and evaluated the animals’ behavioural responses. We found that “fear” odours elicited higher stress levels than “physical stress” and “neutral”, suggesting that cats perceived the valence of the information conveyed by “fear” olfactory signals and regulate their behaviour accordingly. Moreover, the prevalent use of the right nostril (right hemisphere activation) with the increase of stress levels, particularly in response to “fear” odours, provides first evidence of lateralized emotional functions of olfactory pathways in cats.
... Accordingly, although crosslanguage and cross-culture recognition of vocal expression of emotions does occur, it is higher within one's own culture and mother tongue [11], suggesting a role of familiarity in emotion recognition. An increase in emotion recognition, or in correct assignment of production contexts, as a function of familiarity with the species or the emitter has been found when participants were asked to judge vocalizations of cats [17][18][19]40], pigs [27], chimpanzees and tree shrews [16], while mixed results have been found in dogs [16,26,28,41]. Therefore, we also expected that participants that are more familiar with animals in general, and with the species used in our survey, would obtain higher scores. ...
Vocalizations constitute an effective way to communicate both emotional arousal (bodily activation) and valence (negative/positive). There is strong evidence suggesting that the convergence of vocal expression of emotional arousal among animal species occurs, hence enabling cross-species perception of arousal, but it is not clear if the same is true for emotional valence. Here, we conducted a large online survey to test the ability of humans to perceive emotions in the contact calls of several wild and domestic ungulates produced in situations of known emotional arousal (previously validated using either heart rate or locomotion) and valence (validated based on the context of production and behavioural indicators of emotions). Participants (1024 respondents from 48 countries) were able to rate above chance levels the arousal level of vocalizations of three of the six ungulate species and the valence of four of them. Percentages of correct ratings did not differ a lot across species for arousal (49–59%), while they showed much more variation for valence (33–68%). Interestingly, several factors such as age, empathy, familiarity and specific features of the calls enhanced these scores. These findings suggest the existence of a shared emotional system across mammalian species, which is much more pronounced for arousal than valence.
... People that have never lived with an animal attribute far fewer emotions to them than animal owners, and animal keepers tend to report more emotions for their specific animals than non-keepers (Morris, Lesley, & Knight, 2012). Also, people acquainted with certain species are better at classifying the agonistic and affiliative nature of vocalizations produced by these (Scheumann, Hasting, Kotz, & Zimmermann, 2014;Nicastro & Owren, 2003). Our results show that familiarity had a significant contribution to the attribution of MS high in imageability, but not for the attribution of MS classified low in this quality, thereby supporting our hypothesis. ...
The attribution of mental states ( MS ) to other species typically follows a scala naturae pattern. However, “simple” mental states, including emotions, sensing, and feelings are attributed to a wider range of animals as compared to the so-called “higher” cognitive abilities. We propose that such attributions are based on the perceptual quality ( i.e. imageability) of mental representations related to MS concepts. We hypothesized that the attribution of highly imaginable MS is more dependent on the familiarity of participants with animals when compared to the attribution of MS low in imageability. In addition, we also assessed how animal agreeableness, familiarity with animals, and the type of human-animal interaction related to the judged similarity of animals to humans. Sixty-one participants (19 females, 42 males) with a rural (n = 20) and urban (n = 41) background rated twenty-six wild and domestic animals for their perceived similarity with humans and ability to experience a set of MS : (1) Highly imageable MS : joy, anger, and fear, and (2) MS low in imageability: capacity to plan and deceive. Results show that more agreeable and familiar animals were considered more human-like. Primates, followed by carnivores, suines, ungulates, and rodents were rated more human-like than xenarthrans, birds, arthropods, and reptiles. Higher MS ratings were given to more similar animals and more so if the MS attributed were high in imageability. Familiarity with animals was only relevant for the attribution of the MS high in imageability.
... Therefore, the familiarity hypothesis does not seem to be supported by our results. In humans, familiarity with a species has been shown to improve recognition of its emotion or of the context of production associated with vocal production for cats [37], pigs [38], chimpanzees, and tree shrews [13], while mixed results have been found for dogs [39,40]. ...
Background
Discrimination and perception of emotion expression regulate interactions between conspecifics and can lead to emotional contagion (state matching between producer and receiver) or to more complex forms of empathy (e.g., sympathetic concern). Empathy processes are enhanced by familiarity and physical similarity between partners. Since heterospecifics can also be familiar with each other to some extent, discrimination/perception of emotions and, as a result, emotional contagion could also occur between species.
Results
Here, we investigated if four species belonging to two ungulate Families, Equidae (domestic and Przewalski’s horses) and Suidae (pigs and wild boars), can discriminate between vocalizations of opposite emotional valence (positive or negative), produced not only by conspecifics, but also closely related heterospecifics and humans. To this aim, we played back to individuals of these four species, which were all habituated to humans, vocalizations from a unique set of recordings for which the valence associated with vocal production was known. We found that domestic and Przewalski’s horses, as well as pigs, but not wild boars, reacted more strongly when the first vocalization played was negative compared to positive, regardless of the species broadcasted.
Conclusions
Domestic horses, Przewalski’s horses and pigs thus seem to discriminate between positive and negative vocalizations produced not only by conspecifics, but also by heterospecifics, including humans. In addition, we found an absence of difference between the strength of reaction of the four species to the calls of conspecifics and closely related heterospecifics, which could be related to similarities in the general structure of their vocalization. Overall, our results suggest that phylogeny and domestication have played a role in cross-species discrimination/perception of emotions.
... Further, the effect of pet ownership on recognition of animal emotions has not been consistent across the literature [30]. For example, while some studies emphasized that experience can significantly affect recognition of animals' emotions [31,32], others observed only little improvements [30,33]. Likewise, people with varying levels of experience with dogs, being asked to describe the emotional content of dog barks, achieved similar scores [34]. ...
This article proposes design guidelines for 11 affective expressions for the Miro robot, and evaluates the expressions through an online video study with 116 participants. All expressions were recognized significantly above the chance level. For six of the expressions, the correct response was selected significantly more than the others, while more than one emotion was associated to some other expressions. Design decisions and the robot’s limitations that led to selecting other expressions, along with the correct expression, are discussed. We also investigated how participants’ abilities to recognize human and animal emotions, their tendency to anthropomorphize, and their familiarity with and attitudes towards animals and pets might have influenced the recognition of the robot’s affective expressions. Results show significant impact of human emotion recognition, difficulty in understanding animal emotions, and anthropomorphism tendency on recognition of Robot’s expressions. We did not find such effects regarding familiarity with/attitudes towards animals/pets in terms of how they influenced participants’ recognition of the designed affective expressions. We further studied how the robot is perceived in general and showed that it is mostly perceived to be gender neutral, and, while it is often associated with a dog or a rabbit, it can also be perceived as a variety of other animals.
... The authors hypothesized that discrimination was enabled by pitch contour differences (Schötz & van de Weijer, 2014). Human discrimination between meows produced in five different contexts was only slightly above chance level, though previous experience with cats again had a positive effect on discrimination accuracy (Nicastro & Owren, 2003). ...
Previous research has shown that human adults can easily discriminate 2 individual zebra finches (Taeniopygia guttata) by their signature songs, struggle to discriminate 2 individual rhesus monkeys (Macaca mulatta) by their calls, and are unable to discriminate 2 individual dogs (Canis familiaris) by their barks. The purpose of the present experiment was to examine whether acoustic discrimination of individual nonprimate heterospecifics is limited to species producing stereotyped signature songs or whether it is possible with the vocalizations of other species as well. This was tested here with the calls of individual large-billed crows (Corvus macrorhynchos) and the meows of individual domestic cats (Felis catus) using a forced-choice same-different paradigm. Results show a high discrimination accuracy without prior training, although the scores obtained here for both species were lower than those in the zebra finch discrimination task. Discrimination accuracy of cat voices decreased when mean pitch was equalized between individuals but was still possible without this cue. The removal of formant frequencies did not influence the discrimination, and there was no significant performance improvement across trials. These experiments suggest that individual acoustic discrimination is possible not only with species producing signature songs but also with unlearned vocalizations of both birds and nonhuman mammals.
... However, details were also obtained from other sources such as Bradshaw et al. [33], Finka et al. [34], Overall [35], and Shaw & Martin [36]. Vocalisations were omitted, as a single type of vocalisation may be used to express more than one type of emotion [35] and there may be individual differences in vocalisations between cats [37]. The first version of the ethogram was completed in 2016. ...
Background
An accurate assessment of feline behaviour is essential in reducing the risk of handler injury and evaluating/improving feline welfare within veterinary practices. However, inexperience and/or suboptimal education in feline behaviour may cause many veterinary professionals to be ill equipped for this. In addition, busy veterinary professionals may not have time to thoroughly search the literature to remediate this deficiency. Upon searching the literature, terms such as aggression and stress predominate, but these do not completely represent the rich mental lives that cats are now understood to have. Emotions have recently emerged as an alternative approach to animal behaviour/welfare assessment. However, few resources describe how to identify them, and positive emotions are particularly neglected. In addition, no simple, broad, and concise guide to feline emotions currently exists within the research literature. Therefore, this research aimed to develop a straightforward and clear reference guide to feline emotions (ethogram) to aid veterinary professionals in interpreting feline behaviour in practice and for use in veterinary education.
Results
Five primary emotions were identified and defined for domestic species (fear, anger/rage, joy/play, contentment and interest). A feline emotions guide (feline emotions ethogram) was created. Three hundred and seventy-two images were captured of feline behaviours indicative of emotional states. Of these, ten of the best quality and most representative images were selected to illustrate the guide (two of each emotional state). The feline emotions guide and its associated images were subsequently validated by two feline behaviour experts.
Conclusions
Following slight modifications, the emotions definitions yielded during the feline ethogram design process may be transferable to other domestic species. The feline emotions ethogram/guide itself may be particularly helpful for distinguishing immediate motivations and customising patient care within short- term veterinary contexts. Hence, its use may improve feline welfare and feline handling/interactions. However, the guide will need to be reliability tested/ tested in the field and may require adaptation as the feline emotions’ knowledge base grows. In addition, novices may benefit from exposure to more images of feline emotional state, particularly those involving mixed emotions. Freely available online images and videos may be sourced and used to supplement the accompanying image bank.
... In our sample, behaviors exhibited by cats during brushing suggest that this situation does not elicit positive emotions, in spite of the fact that the owner habituated these subjects to be regularly brushed since kittenhood. In fact, cats can react to brushing in a positive (Bradshaw, 2016a) or in a negative manner (Nicastro and Owren, 2003), not only because of habituation, but also depending on individual predisposition and characteristics. Moreover, it is possible that the owner's brushing style (e.g., rough, too fast), or if the cats were brushed only when they already had knots in their fur, influenced the cats' reaction, leading them to dislike brushing. ...
Today, cats are one of the most widespread and beloved companion animals: they share their life with people and are perceived as social partners by their owner. The knowledge and understanding of cat-human communication and of the behavior exhibited in response to different emotions is essential to improve the management of housed cats. The aim of this study is to analyze and compare the behavior of cats in three different situations that can occur in house cats’ lives.
Ten Maine Coon cats, four males and six females, ranging in age from one to 13 years, belonging to a single private owner and managed under the same conditions, were exposed randomly to three different contexts for five minutes (Waiting for food, Isolation in unknown environment and Brushing). All the situations were video-recorded and subsequently analyzed. The behaviors oriented to environment, oriented to food bowl, locomotion, active interactions, yawning, lip licking & swallowing and salivation mainly characterized Waiting for food, while Isolation appears principally characterized by behaviors like hiding, scratching, worried positions and exploration. Withdrawal, passive interactions, aggressive behaviors, facial discomfort and purring characterized Brushing. Vocalizations were significantly more frequent during Isolation and Brushing than during Waiting for food, but it is possible that the characteristics of the vocalizations in these two situations are different. Our principal finding is that cats showed different behavioral patterns in the three situations and, in particular, their behavior during Brushing was very different than in the two other situations. It can be hypothesized that these different behavioral responses are due to the different emotional states elicited by each of the three challenging and potentially stressful situations. Further investigation is being carried out in order to better understand cats’ behaviors and emotions to improve cats’ management in the household.
... Vocalization is the active generation of sounds with the use of specific organs, which propagate through acoustic signals that transmit a wide range of information about the communicator, including his or her emotional, motivational and physiological states [1,2]. A number of studies used vocalization as an analytical tool to assess animal welfare [3][4][5][6][7][8][9], using non-invasive monitoring systems. The vocalization events captured may then be studied with the aid of programs that perform a detailed acoustic analysis of sound waves, employing parameters such as frequency and amplitude of the signals [2], in order to classify the different types of vocalization. ...
Our objective was to identify and characterize the types of vocalization other than meowing (VOM) in two contexts, a pleasant and an aversive situation, and to study the effect of the sex of the animal. A total of 74 cats (32 tom cats and 42 queens) living in the city of Curitiba, Brazil, participated in the study; in total, 68 (29 tom cats and 39 queens) were divided into two groups according to the stimulus they were exposed to: either a pleasant situation (PS), when they were offered a snack, or an aversive situation (AS), with the simulation of a car transport event. The other six animals (three tom cats and three queens) participated in both situations. Only the PS group presented VOM; of the 40 PS animals, 14 presented VOM, mostly acknowledgment or trill and squeak. No correlation was observed between vocalization and cat sex (p = 0.08; Pearson’s Chi-Square). Results show that VOM is exclusively associated with positive situations, suggesting that these vocalizations may be relevant for understanding the valence of cat emotional state. Further studies are warranted to advance knowledge on other VOMs and on the generalization of our findings to other situations.
... Not surprisingly the frequency of these sounds lowers in cats that become feral. Wild cats hardly ever make such sounds [14]. Students considered the sounds of house cats as more friendly than the sounds of wild cats, suggesting an adaptation by house cats to human wishes [15]. ...
Animal protection makes only sense when animal suffering and welfare exist. Suffering and welfare require the existence of feelings in a species. The question “Which species possess feelings?” is, therefore, important. Scientists draw the line between species with and without feelings at different places in the animal kingdom. Reasons for laymen to assume or discard the existence of feelings in different species are considered. It is mentioned that science is fundamentally unable to draw this line. (A view often attacked under the influence of psychology that belongs to the humanities). It is also mentioned that science is able to make the presence of feelings in an animal species more, or less, convincing. The views of the different scientists are discussed. It is argued why, in my opinion, all animal species possess feelings. Although not all scientists share this view, many scientists are of opinion that at least farm animals possess feelings. Laypeople who are not influenced by economic or other interests mostly do not question this opinion. The protection of farm animals is justified to avoid suffering in case these farm animals possess feelings.
... Familiarity has been demonstrated to be a factor in identifying information contained within vocalizations (e.g., content, context, etc.). For example, cat vocalizations (i.e., meow sounds) that had been recorded from different cats in multiple behavioral contexts were best classified by human participants with more exposure to cats (Nicastro & Owren, 2003). In the current study, human participants' significant transfer of training to human and blackcapped chickadee vocalizations may have been due to familiarity, although it is possible that some participants did not have experience with black-capped chickadees. ...
Recently, evidence for acoustic universals in vocal communication was found by demonstrating that humans can identify levels of arousal in vocalizations produced by species across three biological classes (Filippi et al., 2017). Here, we extend this work by testing whether two vocal learning species, humans and chickadees, can discriminate vocalizations of high and low arousal using operant discrimination go/no-go tasks. Stimuli included vocalizations from nine species: giant panda, American alligator, common raven, hourglass treefrog, African elephant, Barbary macaque, domestic pig, black-capped chickadee, and human. Subjects were trained to respond to high or low arousal vocalizations, then tested with additional high and low arousal vocalizations produced by each species. Chickadees (Experiment 1) and humans (Experiment 2) learned to discriminate between high and low arousal stimuli and significantly transferred the discrimination to additional panda, human, and chickadee vocalizations. Finally, we conducted discriminant function analyses using four acoustic measures, finding evidence suggesting that fundamental frequency played a role in responding during the task. However, these analyses also suggest roles for other acoustic factors as well as familiarity. In sum, the results from these studies provide evidence that chickadees and humans are capable of perceiving arousal in vocalizations produced by multiple species. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2019 APA, all rights reserved).
... Furthermore, there is a small number of papers that identify certain socio-cognitive abilities which also exist in the domain of cat-human interactions, such as the recognition of the owner's voice (Saito & Shinozuka, 2013); using the owner's expressions as social reference (Merola, Lazzaroni, Marshall-Pescini, & Prato-Previde, 2015); recognition of a human's attentional state (Ito, Watanabe, Takagi, Arahori, & Saito, 2016) and following visual signals (pointing with arm) in a two-way choice situation (Miklósi, Pongrácz, Lakatos, Topál, & Csányi, 2005). The literature on cats' interspecific social capacity is still very narrow compared to similar research on dogs (for review see Miklósi & Topál, 2013), and there are indications that show cat-human communication might be less-developed than similar domains of human-dog interactions (weak emotion recognition by cats: Galvan & Vonk, 2016; humans do not attribute distinct meaning to cat vocalizations: Nicastro & Owren, 2003). The main goal of our research was to investigate such aspects of cats' understanding of human communication that are considered highly specific to complex social interactions and adaptation to the anthropogenic niche: gaze following and sensitivity to ostensive communication. ...
Companion cats often occupy the same anthropogenic niche as dogs in human families. Still, cat cognition remains an underrepresented research subject in ethology. Our goal was to examine whether two components that are crucial in dog-human communicative interactions (sensitivity to ostensive signals; gaze following) are also present in cats. In a two-object choice task, we used dynamic and momentary gazing in ostensive and non-ostensive communicative situations. We tested 41 cats at their owner's home. Cats on the group level achieved a 70% overall success rate, showing that they are capable of following human gaze as a referential cue. Cats' success rate was unaffected both by the type of gazing and the presence/absence of ostensive communication, showing that the subjects followed readily even the more difficult momentary cues. We found a trend (p = 0.085), showing that young cats (max. 1 year old) may achieve higher success rate than adult animals. Ostension had a significant effect on the latency of eye contact, which was the shortest when the experimenter called the cat's attention with ostensive signals (p = 0.006). Our results are the first that prove cats' ability to follow human gaze, which is considered to be one of the more difficult visual referential signals given during human-animal interactions. Although ostension did not affect the success rate of cats, we found ostensive human signals to be a more effective attention elicitor compared to non-ostensive vocalizations. Our study therefore provided the first insight to the existence of sensitivity to human ostension in another non-human species besides dogs. These results emphasize the possible relevance of the domestication process and responsiveness to socialization in the development of human-compatible socio-cognitive skills even in such animals as the cat, where the ancestor was not a highly social species.
... Moreover, humans were not able to differentiate threatening and playful single growls, probably due to the lack of distinctive temporal features (Taylor et al., 2009). Similarly, listeners show low accuracy in recognizing the assumed valence or the context of cat meows (Nicastro & Owren, 2003), of a wide range of cat vocalizations (Schötz & Weijer, 2014), and of rhesus macaque calls . In line with these latter findings, Scheumann et al. (2014) used human infant, dog, chimpanzee, and tree shrew calls from differently valenced contexts and found that experience with these animals had a strong effect on the assessment of emotional load. ...
... Experience also affects accuracy when humans assign cat meows to one of five behavioral contexts: food-related, agonistic, affiliative, obstacle, and distress. Although most participants are accurate at above-chance rates, accuracy increases with the humans' familiarity with cats and the number of calls presented to them (Nicastro and Owren, 2003). In accordance with these observations, neural imaging studies suggest that while a shared mechanism of emotional valence perception is used by humans to process both conspecific and heterospecific vocalizations, interpretation may depend on experience and learning (Belin et al., 2008). ...
... There are results showing that dogs, for example, provide gaze alternations as effective referential signals for humans in the case of hoping for a treat that is otherwise unapproachable for themgaze alternations serve as a highly effective signal for eliciting and directing human attention (Polgárdi, Topál, & Csányi, 2000). While research on cats' vocalizations showed that human listeners have difficulties in deciphering the contextual meaning of different meows of cats (Nicastro & Owren, 2003), with a slight advantage in the case of those subjects who had extensive experience with these calls. Besides the experience, structure can also affect the betweenspecies understandability of signals, because genetic predispositions may determine both the detectability (Wiley, 2006) and meaning of particular messages (Meints, Racca, & Hickey, 2010). ...
Interspecific communication provides good opportunity for studying signal evolution. In this theoretical paper, we hypothesized that vocal signaling in dogs may show specific changes that made it more suitable for interspecific communication in the anthropogenic niche. We assumed that (1) some dog vocalizations will diverge from the corresponding exemplars of wolves; (2) they provide comprehendible affective, indexical, and contextual information for humans; (3) some aspects of dog vocalizations are more typical for the interspecific than for the intraspecific domain. We found that the most unique type of vocalization in the dog is barking. We proved that human listeners can contextually categorize dog barks, as well as attribute distinct inner states of dogs based on the barks. We found that dogs are sensitive to both contextual and individual-specific features of other dogs' barks. However, dogs showed almost no response to the bark emitted in isolation, which is one of the easiest to recognize by humans, indicating the possibility of a specific, new communicative role for barks, not present in its original function. Our conclusion is that the qualitative and quantitative proliferation of barks can be explained by mechanisms of evolution such as ritualization and adaptive radiation. Barks became suitable for conveying a more various set of information than the original barks of wolves did. Barks also became typical in such contexts where originally they were not used - such as the contact seeking calls of isolated specimens, apparently targeted at the human, and not at a canine audience.
... These results are further supported by playback studies on cross-taxa recognition. These studies already showed that humans are able to classify context and valence-specific animal vocalizations (cats: Nicastro and Owren, 2003;dogs: Pongrácz et al., 2005dogs: Pongrácz et al., , 2006dogs: Pongrácz et al., , 2010dogs: Pongrácz et al., , 2011Molnár et al., 2006Molnár et al., , 2010Flom et al., 2009;Taylor et al., 2009;pigs: Tallet et al., 2010;macaques: Linnankoski et al., 1994). However, in most of these studies human participants only listened to one species, either a phylogenetically closely related species (primates) or a somewhat familiar species (domesticated species e.g., dog, cats). ...
Darwin (1872) postulated that emotional expressions contain universals that are retained across species. We recently showed that human rating responses were strongly affected by a listener's familiarity with vocalization types, whereas evidence for universal cross-taxa emotion recognition was limited. To disentangle the impact of evolutionarily retained mechanisms (phylogeny) and experience-driven cognitive processes (familiarity), we compared the temporal unfolding of event-related potentials (ERPs) in response to agonistic and affiliative vocalizations expressed by humans and three animal species. Using an auditory oddball novelty paradigm, ERPs were recorded in response to task-irrelevant novel sounds, comprising vocalizations varying in their degree of phylogenetic relationship and familiarity to humans. Vocalizations were recorded in affiliative and agonistic contexts. Offline, participants rated the vocalizations for valence, arousal, and familiarity. Correlation analyses revealed a significant correlation between a posteriorly distributed early negativity and arousal ratings. More specifically, a contextual category effect of this negativity was observed for human infant and chimpanzee vocalizations but absent for other species vocalizations. Further, a significant correlation between the later and more posteriorly P3a and P3b responses and familiarity ratings indicates a link between familiarity and attentional processing. A contextual category effect of the P3b was observed for the less familiar chimpanzee and tree shrew vocalizations. Taken together, these findings suggest that early negative ERP responses to agonistic and affiliative vocalizations may be influenced by evolutionary retained mechanisms, whereas the later orienting of attention (positive ERPs) may mainly be modulated by the prior experience.
... This finding is in accordance with the results of Taylor et al. [33] who showed that humans could categorize and attribute inner state to the resynthesized growl bouts in which the IGIs were similar to natural growl sequences. Nicastro & Owren [16] showed a similar tendency in context recognition of cat vocalizations. In the case of dog barks, rhythm based on inter-bark intervals was found as an important cue for humans to assess the dogs' inner state [34]: longer pauses between individual barks resulted in lower scores of aggression. ...
Vocal expressions of emotions follow simple rules to encode the inner state of the caller into acoustic parameters, not just within species, but also in cross-species communication. Humans use these structural rules to attribute emotions to dog vocalizations, especially to barks, which match with their contexts. In contrast, humans were found to be unable to differentiate between playful and threatening growls, probably because single growls' aggression level was assessed based on acoustic size cues. To resolve this contradiction, we played back natural growl bouts from three social contexts (food guarding, threatening and playing) to humans, who had to rate the emotional load and guess the context of the playbacks. Listeners attributed emotions to growls according to their social contexts. Within threatening and playful contexts, bouts with shorter, slower pulsing growls and showing smaller apparent body size were rated to be less aggressive and fearful, but more playful and happy. Participants associated the correct contexts with the growls above chance. Moreover, women and participants experienced with dogs scored higher in this task. Our results indicate that dogs may communicate honestly their size and inner state in a serious contest situation, while manipulatively in more uncertain defensive and playful contexts.
... Notably, Schö tz (2012) mentions "longer phrases" which are as yet unexplored. Potential obstacles to the development of an objective, standardized, and reliable classification system for cat vocalizations include human emotional response to different cat sounds (Nicastro and Owren 2003), which may bias our classification attempts, and a general human inability to consistently identify specific sounds made by cats or clearly identify contexts in which specific cat sounds are produced (Ellis et al. 2015). Further, as we will discuss below, discrepancies between human classifications of cat sounds and results of statistical clustering methods remain unresolved (McKinley 1982). ...
Cat vocal behavior, in particular, the vocal and social behavior of feral cats, is poorly understood, as are the differences between feral and fully domestic cats. The relationship between feral cat social and vocal behavior is important because of the markedly different ecology of feral and domestic cats, and enhanced comprehension of the repertoire and potential information content of feral cat calls can provide both better understanding of the domestication and socialization process, and improved welfare for feral cats undergoing adoption. Previous studies have used conflicting classification schemes for cat vocalizations, often relying on onomatopoeic or popular descriptions of call types (e.g., “miow”). We studied the vocalizations of 13 unaltered domestic cats that complied with our behavioral definition used to distinguish feral cats from domestic. A total of 71 acoustic units were extracted and visually analyzed for the construction of a hierarchical classification of vocal sounds, based on acoustic properties. We identified 3 major categories (tonal, pulse, and broadband) that further breakdown into 8 subcategories, and show a high degree of reliability when sounds are classified blindly by independent observers (Fleiss’ Kappa $K$ = 0.863). Due to the limited behavioral contexts in this study, additional subcategories of cat vocalizations may be identified in the future, but our hierarchical classification system allows for the addition of new categories and new subcategories as they are described. This study shows that cat vocalizations are diverse and complex, and provides an objective and reliable classification system that can be used in future studies.
... Domestic cats are more vocal when compared to other carnivores (Peters and Wozencraft, 1989;Yeon et al., 2011), and their meows are mostly directed at humans and only infrequently produced for conspecifics (Bradshaw and Cameron-Beaumont, 2000;Yeon et al., 2011). Humans are able to accurately classify meow sounds (Nicastro and Owren, 2003) and attribute meaning and emotional context to these calls (Nicastro, 2002;Belin et al., 2008). McComb et al. (2009) proposed that specific types of purrs (with embedded meow sounds) exploit human sensory biases by mimicking human infant cries in order to solicit enhanced levels of attention and care. ...
... Tip twitching is a precursor to a next stage of thought and, action. (Bradshaw & Cameron-Beaumont, 2000) Researchers have stated that effective sharing of information between a non-human animal and the human animal is critical for the former when they are dependent upon humans (Nicastro & Owren, 2003). Such non-human animals need to be able to communicate specific information, or a reference signal, about a particular need. ...
Both humans and cats have similar identifiable sections within the brain to control emotion. Cats (like humans) also have temporal, occipital, front and parietal lobes of their cerebral cortex, with each region connected in the same way. Cats unfortunately, lack the mouth palate shape (partly due to the Jacobson Organ) and the brain vocal apparatus to comprehend use of a spoken, complex language. Although the feline has evolved differently, cats are quite capable of communicating via other types of verbal and non–verbal means.
... Owner's perceptions are thus a useful complementary tool to behavioural testing [29]. For instance, the experience of cat owners means they can classify cat vocalisations better than non-cat owners [49], especially when it is their own cat [50]. ...
Free-roaming cats are exposed to a variety of risks, including involvement in road traffic accidents. One way of mitigating these risks is to contain cats, for example using an electronic boundary fence system that delivers an electric ‘correction’ via a collar if a cat ignores a warning cue and attempts to cross the boundary. However, concerns have been expressed over the welfare impact of such systems. Our aim was to determine if long-term exposure to an electronic containment system was associated with reduced cat welfare. We compared 46 owned domestic cats: 23 cats that had been contained by an electronic containment system for more than 12 months (AF group); and 23 cats with no containment system that were able to roam more widely (C group). We assessed the cats’ behavioural responses and welfare via four behavioural tests (unfamiliar person test; novel object test; sudden noise test; cognitive bias test) and an owner questionnaire. In the unfamiliar person test, C group lip-licked more than the AF group, whilst the AF group looked at, explored and interacted more with the unfamiliar person than C group. In the novel object test, the AF group looked at and explored the object more than C group. No significant differences were found between AF and C groups for the sudden noise or cognitive bias tests. Regarding the questionnaire, C group owners thought their cats showed more irritable behaviour and AF owners thought that their cats toileted inappropriately more often than C owners. Overall, AF cats were less neophobic than C cats and there was no evidence of significant differences between the populations in general affective state. These findings indicate that an electronic boundary fence with clear pre-warning cues does not impair the long term quality of life of cats.
Vocalization may transmit information from the emitting animal, including information about his or her emotional state. This study aimed to compare the vocal and behavioral responses of domestic cats during an aversive and a pleasant situation. A total of 74 cats (29 males and 45 females) in the city of Curitiba, Southern Brazil, participated in the study; 68 (26 males and 42 females) were divided into two treatments: an aversive situation (AS), which was a car transport event where the cat was in a crate, or a pleasant situation (PS), where the cat was were offered a snack. The other animals (three males and three females) participated in both situations. Behavioral signals and individual vocalizations were registered through video recordings and further evaluated in each scenario. Cats in the PS had a higher fundamental frequency of vocalizations (10.1%), a lower range of pitches (tessitura) (33.9%) and twice the rate of head movement rates as compared to AS. For call duration there was significant interaction between treatment and sex. Additionally, there were differences in vocal parameters and behavioral signals due to sex, age and coat color. Females and kittens have higher fundamental frequencies may be due to anatomical characteristics. Solid-colored coated cats presented higher fundamental frequency than other coat colors. Overall, vocal parameters and behavioral signals seem useful indicators for studying the emotions of cats in different situations. Further studies are warranted to understand the subtleties of cat vocalization across sex, age and coat color.
In the cat four different types of vocalization, mews, howls, cries, and hisses were generated by microstimulation in different parts of the periaqueductal gray (PAG). While mews imply positive vocal expressions, howls, hisses, and cries represent negative vocal expressions. In the intermediate PAG, mews were generated in the lateral column, howls, and hisses in the ventrolateral column. Cries were generated in two other regions, the lateral column of the rostral PAG and the ventrolateral column of the caudal PAG. In order to define the specific motor patterns of the mews, howls, and cries, the following muscles were recorded during these vocalizations; larynx (cricothyroid, thyroarytenoid, and posterior cricoarytenoid), tongue (genioglossus), jaw (digastric), and respiration muscles (diaphragm, internal intercostal, external, and internal abdominal oblique). During these mews, howls, and cries we analyzed the frequency, intensity, activation cascades power density, turns, and amplitude analysis of the electromyograms (EMGs). It appeared that each type of vocalization consists of a specific circumscribed motor coordination. The nucleus retroambiguus (NRA) in the caudal medulla is known to serve as the final premotor interneuronal output system for vocalization. Although neurochemical microstimulation in the NRA itself also generated vocalizations, they only consisted of guttural sounds, the EMGs of which involved only small parts of the EMGs of the mews, howls, and cries generated by neurochemical stimulation in the PAG. These results demonstrate that positive and negative vocalizations are generated in different parts of the PAG. These parts have access to different groups of premotoneurons in the NRA, that, in turn, have access to different groups of motoneurons in the brainstem and spinal cord, resulting in different vocalizations. The findings would serve a valuable model for diagnostic assessment of voice disorders in humans.
In this chapter, the phonetic variation of the vocal communication between domestic cats and humans is summarised and described, based on previous research as well as more recent studies and observations. Emphasis lies on classifying and describing the different vocalisation types of the cat using phonetic methods and terminology. The articulation, phonetic transcription and acoustic patterns of the most common vocalisation types are described. In addition, the segments (vowel and consonants), the prosody (the tone, intonation, rhythm and dynamics) of cat sounds as well as human perception of cat vocalisations is summarised.
Nobody would dispute that cats and dogs are the two most popular species of companion animals for humans. It is no wonder that dogs are often considered to be the best friends and adopted family members of human beings: They developed the high social ability to communicate with humans during the two species' long history of co-habitation. However, it seems strange that cats are in the same position as dogs in human society, because they are more individual and less social than dogs. This review first presents the history of cat domestication. Next, it discusses the reasons why cats are now human companion animals despite such a history. This paper will discuss the cognitive and behavioral characteristics in cats that promote human-cat interaction and the similarities between cats and humans. Finally, it will discuss the significance of the study of cats' sociality.
La relation homme-animal se construit à partir des interactions entre chacun des partenaires qui se transmettent des informations via les signaux sensoriels. Mieux comprendre l’effet de ces interactions passe par la détermination de la sensibilité des animaux aux signaux émis par l’homme. Les interactions vocales entre l’homme et le porc domestique ont été peu étudiées, alors que ce canal est utilisé par l’homme dans les pratiques d’élevage.La thèse a donc cherché à déterminer (1) la sensibilité des porcelets aux variations du signal vocal, (2) les effets de son utilisation dans la mise en place de la relation homme-animal et (3) son utilisation dans la communication référentielle avec l’animal. Les réponses des porcs ont été évaluées (1) dans des tests de discrimination de stimuli vocaux, (2) lors de la mise en place de la relation et de tests de réponse à la présence humaine et (3) lors de tests de choix en présence de signaux humains.Les porcelets se sont révélés sensibles à la voix féminine neutre, sans montrer d’attirance particulière pour cette voix. Néanmoins, une voix féminine aigüe et parlant lentement les a attirés physiquement. Associée à la présence répétée de l’homme, la voix féminine aigüe et lente est associée par l’animal à une valence positive. Les résultats suggèrent que la voix pourrait être impliquée dans la reconnaissance de l’homme par les animaux. Enfin, il est possible d’apprendre aux animaux à utiliser les propriétés référentielles de la voix, mais uniquement lorsqu’elle est combinée à des signaux visuels (pointage du doigt statique et dynamiq
This chapter focuses on the behavioral development of cats. Evolving from solitary predators, the communication behavior of cats has functioned to maintain comfortable spacing with their conspecifics. The process of domestication and the tendency for cats to gather in greater density around reliable sources of food and shelter has modified some of these behaviors as domestic cats have evolved a more flexible social structure. Aspects of cat behavior are a result of descent from a solitary carnivore that has undergone selection to evolve as a domestic animal with a flexible social structure. Their social structure is flexible based on the circumstances and a range of agonistic, defensive, and affiliative behaviors are employed to manage access to resources and contact with other cats. The chapter presents some common situations where cats may engage in aggressive behavior toward other cats, other animals, or humans, focusing on the various types of aggression of cats.
Cat vocal behavior, in particular, the vocal and social behavior of feral cats, is poorly understood, as are the differences between feral and fully domestic cats. The relationship between feral cat social and vocal behavior is important because of the markedly different ecology of feral and domestic cats, and enhanced comprehension of the repertoire and potential information content of feral cat calls can provide both better understanding of the domestication and socialization process, and improved welfare for feral cats undergoing adoption. Previous studies have used conflicting classification schemes for cat vocalizations, often relying on onomatopoeic or popular descriptions of call types (e.g. “miow”). We studied the vocalizations of thirteen unaltered domestic cats that complied with our behavioral definition used to distinguish feral cats from domestic. A total of 71 acoustic units were extracted and visually analyzed for the construction of a hierarchical classification of vocal sounds, based on acoustic properties. We identified three major categories (tonal, pulse, and broadband) that further breakdown into eight subcategories, and show a high degree of reliability when sounds are classified blindly by independent observers (Fleiss’ Kappa K = 0.863). Due to the limited behavioral contexts in this study, additional subcategories of cat vocalizations may be identified in the future, but our hierarchical classification system allows for the addition of new categories and new subcategories as they are described. This study shows that cat vocalizations are diverse and complex, and provides an objective and reliable classification system that can be used in future studies.
Research activities on the welfare of domestic cats have increased greatly in recent years. Of particular note is the emergence, especially in the USA and to a lesser extent in the UK, of shelter medicine as a veterinary specialist discipline in its own right. Its emergence is immensely gratifying, and is already leading to major improvements and refinements in the ways that overpopulation, one of the most important global issues in cat welfare, is being tackled. Significant advances are being made in the ways shelters are managed and cats are cared for. In addition, we are beginning to understand better why cats end up in shelters, what to do about it and how to promote successful adoptions. As a result, the number of healthy cats and kittens euthanised in shelters has decreased in some countries, although it still remains much too high. There have also been improvements in our understanding of the needs of cats and how they can be met, whether cats are housed in the home, the shelter or boarding cattery, the veterinary surgery or the research facility. Innovative ways of enriching the environment of cats in order to meet these needs and improve their welfare are being developed and applied in practice. By enriching the lives of cats under our care, we also enrich our own lives.
The anthropological fields of ethnobiology and ethnoscience, in their analysis of indigenous environmental knowledge, have largely focused on forms of conceptual knowledge such as biological terms and taxonomic categories. However, their examination of subjects' environmental knowledge does not explicitly address how subjects relate to their environment through varied cognitive and phenomenal mechanisms. By including other types of knowledge, such as perceptual acuity and interpretive range, differences in indigenous knowledge and the processes that shape such knowledge may be better understood. In this article, I report the results of experiments comparing the abilities of Hindus and Muslims in Bali to discern the differences in dog vocalizations and to diagnose the presence of rabies in dogs. The results highlight the importance of a negative symbolic association, the Muslim taboo on interaction with dogs, which constrains both perceptions of dogs and interpretations of the animal's behavior. Evidence for significant variation in a subject's perceptions of dog vocalizations provides greater context to prior studies that found a common ability to understand the vocalizations of dogs. Such differences, combined with the restriction of a subject's interpretative range and depth in analyzing the presence of rabies, illustrate how symbolic systems can induce a form of what psychologists refer to as "perceptual narrowing."
Barking in domestic dogs still remains a topic of controversial discussions. While some authors assess dog-barking an acoustic means of expression becoming more and more sophisticated during domestication, others name this sound type "non-communicative". Vocal repertoires as works on individual sound types are rare, however, and there has been almost no work done on low-intensity, close-range vocalizations, yet such types of vocalization are especially important with the more social canids, hence, with the human-dog-communication and understanding of dogs. Most of the investigations published so far are based on auditive sound impressions and lack objectivity. The principal method used in this study was sonagraphic. This facilitates the identification of sounds and reveales, whether subjective classification can be verified by objectively measured parameters. Finally, meanings, functions and emotions were examined for all the major sounds described and are discussed in terms of relationships between sound structure and signal function, signal emission and social context as behavioural response, and overlapping channels of communication. Ontogeny of acoustic communication in 11 European wolves has been compared to various dog breeds (8 Standard Poodles, 8 Toy Poodles, 15 Kleine Münsterländer, 11 Weimaraner Hunting Dogs, 16 Tervueren, 12 American Staffordshire Terriers, and 13 German Shepherds, 12 Alaskan Malamutes, and 9 Bull Terriers) from birth up to 8 (12) weeks resp. 4 (12) months of age. Noisy and harmonic sound groups were analysed separately as overriding units. Following parameters were used: fmax=maximum of spectrographic pictured sounds (Hz), xfo=mean of the lowest frequency band of harmonic sounds (Hz), xfd=mean of the frequency of strongest amplitude of noisy sounds (Hz), delta f=frequency range of sounds (Hz), duration of sounds (ms). Statistical analysis was run on "Statistica", Release 4,0. Within the sound type barking 2 to 12 subunits were classified in the different breeds, according to their context-specific spectrographic design, and behavioural responses. Categories of function / emotion include f.e. social play, play soliticing, exploration, caregiving, social contact and "greeting", loneliness, and agonistc behaviours. "Interaction" was the most common category of social context for masted barkings (56% of occurences). Especially close-range vocalizations, concerning the major sound type of most domestic dogs, the bark, evolved highly variable. However, the ecological niche of domestic dogs is highly variable, just as the individual differences in the dogs are, which seem to be breed-typical to a great extent. Thus, complexity within the dog's vocal repertoire, and therefore enhancement of its communicative value, is achieved by many subunits of bark, some standing for specific motivations, informations and expressions. Complexity within the dogs' vocal repertoire is extended by the use of mixed sounds in the barking context. Transitions and gradations to a great extend occur via bark sounds: harmonic, intermediate and noisy subunits.
To establish a framework for discussing mammalian vocalizations, relevant terminology and concepts from the theory of nonlinear dynamics are introduced. It is suggested that a variety of nonlinear phenomena including subharmonics, biphonation, and deterministic chaos are normally occurring phonatory events. The whole spectrum of these phenomena can be found in the repertoire of the African wild dog Lycaon pictus. In addition, examples of nonlinear phenomena in a wide range of other mammalian taxa will be presented. Moreover, some artifacts in sound spectrographic analysis are listed which may be misinterpreted as nonlinear phenomena.Within the framework of nonlinear dynamics, a consistent terminology is proposed and our observations are related to laryngeal sound production mechanisms. Finally, some hypotheses concerning the communicative potential of the described phenomena are discussed.
We outline a model of nonhuman primate vocal behavior, proposing that the function of calling is to influence the behavior of conspecific receivers and that a Pavlovian conditioning framework can account for important aspects of how such influence occurs. Callers are suggested to use vocalizations to elicit affective responses in others, thereby altering the behavior of these individuals. Responses can either be unconditioned, being produced directly by the signal itself, or conditioned, resulting from past interactions in which the sender both called and produced affective responses in the receiver through other means.
Understanding the information conveyed by animal signals requires studies of both production and perception. It is important to determine the relationship between signal morphology and the circumstances of production, the way signaller behavior varies with motivational state and the role of context in mediating responses to signals. Alarm calls are well-suited to research of this type because they are widespread in birds and mammals and typically evoke unambiguous responses. We review studies of alarm calling in primates and ground-dwelling sciurid rodents, concentrating especially on whether these signal systems may be viewed as ‘functionally referential’, that is, as conveying sufficient information about an event for receivers to select appropriate responses. Comparisons of the physical, behavioral and habitat characteristics of these species suggest that incompatibility of the escape responses required to avoid different classes of predators may have been an important factor in the evolution of functionally referential alarm calls.
It is suggested that characters which develop through mate preference confer handicaps on the selected individuals in their survival. These handicaps are of use to the selecting sex since they test the quality of the mate. The size of characters selected in this way serve as marks of quality. The understanding that a handicap, which tests for quality, can evolve as a consequence of its advantage to the individual, may provide an explanation for many puzzling evolutionary problems. Such an interpretation may provide an alternative to other hypotheses which assumed complicated selective mechanisms, such as group selection or kin selection, which do not act directly on the individual.
Mitochondrial DNA control region sequences were analyzed from 162 wolves at 27 localities worldwide and from 140 domestic
dogs representing 67 breeds. Sequences from both dogs and wolves showed considerable diversity and supported the hypothesis
that wolves were the ancestors of dogs. Most dog sequences belonged to a divergent monophyletic clade sharing no sequences
with wolves. The sequence divergence within this clade suggested that dogs originated more than 100,000 years before the present.
Associations of dog haplotypes with other wolf lineages indicated episodes of admixture between wolves and dogs. Repeated
genetic exchange between dog and wolf populations may have been an important source of variation for artificial selection.
The purpose of this study was to examine the role of formant frequency movements in vowel recognition. Measurements of vowel duration, fundamental frequency, and formant contours were taken from a database of acoustic measurements of 1668 /hVd/ utterances spoken by 45 men, 48 women, and 46 children [Hillenbrand et al., J. Acoust. Soc. Am. 97, 3099-3111 (1995)]. A 300-utterance subset was selected from this database, representing equal numbers of 12 vowels and approximately equal numbers of tokens produced by men, women, and children. Listeners were asked to identify the original, naturally produced signals and two formant-synthesized versions. One set of "original formant" (OF) synthetic signals was generated using the measured formant contours, and a second set of "flat formant" (FF) signals was synthesized with formant frequencies fixed at the values measured at the steadiest portion of the vowel. Results included: (a) the OF synthetic signals were identified with substantially greater accuracy than the FF signals; and (b) the naturally produced signals were identified with greater accuracy than the OF synthetic signals. Pattern recognition results showed that a simple approach to vowel specification based on duration, steady-state F0, and formant frequency measurements at 20% and 80% of vowel duration accounts for much but by no means all of the variation in listeners' labeling of the three types of stimuli.
On the basis of a study by D. J. Povinelli, D. T. Bierschwale, and C. G. Cech (1999), the performance of family dogs (Canis familiaris) was examined in a 2-way food choice task in which 4 types of directional cues were given by the experimenter: pointing and gazing, head-nodding ("at target"), head turning above the correct container ("above target"), and glancing only ("eyes only"). The results showed that the performance of the dogs resembled more closely that of the children in D. J. Povinelli et al.'s study, in contrast to the chimpanzees' performance in the same study. It seems that dogs, like children, interpret the test situation as being a form of communication. The hypothesis is that this similarity is attributable to the social experience and acquired social routines in dogs because they spend more time in close contact with humans than apes do, and as a result dogs are probably more experienced in the recognition of human gestures.
In linear regression the mean surface in sample space is a plane. In non-linear regression the mean surface may be an arbitrary curved surface but in other respects the models are similar. In practice the mean surface in most non-linear regression models will be approximately planar in the region(s) of high likelihood allowing good approximations based on linear regression techniques to be used. Non-linear regression models can still present tricky computational and inferential problems. (Indeed, the examples here exceeded the capacity of S-PLUS for Windows 3.1.)
A sense of hearing can only be demonstrated and described through an analysis of sound’s effects on behavior. Since we can observe only the behavior of living animals, the study of the historical evolution of the sense of hearing seems impossible.
Play signals are known to function in the solicitation and maintenance of intraspecific play, but their role in interspecific play is relatively unstudied. We carried out two studies to examine interspecific signalling when humans play with domestic dogs, Canis familiaris. In the first, we recorded dog–owner play sessions on video to identify actions used by 21 dog owners to initiate play with their dogs. Thirty-five actions were each used by three or more owners. These included postures, vocalizations and physical contact with the dog. The actions varied greatly in their apparent success at instigating play which was, surprisingly, unrelated to the frequency with which they were used. We then did an experiment to determine the effect of composites of commonly used signals upon the behaviour of 20 Labrador retrievers. The performance of both ‘Bow’ and ‘Lunge’ by a human altered the subsequent behaviour of the dogs. Both signals caused increases in play, and Lunge produced significant increases in play bout frequency and mean bout duration. The efficiency of both these postural signals was enhanced when they were accompanied by play vocalizations. Thus, specific actions used by humans do communicate a playful context to dogs and can be described as interspecific play signals.
Vocal alarm signals of male domestic fowl given in the presence of predators and other ground and aerial objects were recorded and analyzed. Studies were conducted under semi-naturalistic conditions and a telemetric technique was used to facilitate high quality sound recording. Cockerels gave ground alarm calls specifically to objects moving on the substrate and aerial alarm calls to objects moving above in free space. Vocalizations were associated with both dangerous and harmless objects. We therefore investigated variation in sound structure of aerial alarm calls with reference to flying predators and non-predators. A multidimensional contingency table analysis revealed a significant tendency for qualitatively different aerial alarm calls to be associated with flying predators and non-predators. Differences in call structure were restricted to the two first units of the alarm call. We tested the hypotheses that variation in aerial alarm call structure might be affected by either the distance separating the bird from the object or the angular size of the object projected onto the retina of the cockerel. Statistical analysis showed that the angular size was a good predictor of variation of the second unit of alarm call. The distance it self was less predictive. The first unit of the alarm call was not affected by either the distance or the angular size of the object. We propose that this part of the call has a more general function of alerting the conspecific companions. We conclude that alarm vocalizations of male domestic fowl refer specifically to a certain type of stimulus object, either moving on the ground or flying. For alarm calls correlated with aerial stimuli the specific angular size of a stimulus object moving in the air is a good predictor of call structure. We suggest that this way of dealing with flying objects as stimuli for alarm calls is the result of a predator detection strategy in which the benefits of an expanded field of vision, an important adaptation for ground-dwelling birds, exceed the costs of alarming to harmless birds and other aerial objects.
Yellow-bellied marmots,Marmota flaviventriswere reported to produce qualitatively different alarm calls in response to different predators. To test this claim rigorously, yellow-bellied marmot alarm communication was studied at two study sites in Colorado and at one site in Utah. Natural alarm calls were observed and alarm calls were artificially elicited with trained dogs, a model badger, a radiocontrolled glider and by walking towards marmots. Marmots ‘whistled’, ‘chucked’ and ‘trilled’ in response to alarming stimuli. There was no evidence that either of the three call types, or the acoustic structure of whistles, the most common alarm call, uniquely covaried with predator type. Marmots primarily varied the rate, and potentially a few frequency characteristics, as a function of the risk the caller experienced. Playback experiments were conducted to determine the effects of call type (chucks versus whistles), whistle rate and whistle volume on marmot responsiveness. Playback results suggested that variation in whistle number/rate could communicate variation in risk. No evidence was found of intraspecific variation in the mechanism used to communicate risk: marmots at all study sites produced the same vocalizations and appeared to vary call rate as a function of risk. There was significant individual variation in call structure, but acoustic parameters that were individually variable were not used to communicate variation in risk.
Domestic dogs in the Near East have been identified on the basis of cultural criteria, but identifications based on morphological criteria are controversial. Measurements of carnassial teeth and of the facial region of the cranium and mandible reveal that wolf/dog remains from the Natufian (c. 12,000 BP) and later cultures of Israel exhibit a morphological pattern that is the opposite of that expected under natural selection, but that conforms well to that expected in early domestication. The Geometric Kebaran wolves preceding the Natufian domesticates are very large individuals, probably in response to the climatic conditions of the period, and this may indicate one of the following: (a) the wolves domesticated in Israel were of a large race, contrary to previous theories on the roots of dog domestication; (b) the dog was domesticated at a period earlier than the Natufian.
Our book examines the mechanisms that underlie social behavior and communication in East African vervet monkeys. Our goal is to describe the sophistication of primate intelligence and to probe its limits. We suggest that vervets and other primates make good primatologists. They observe social interactions, recognize the relations that exist among others, and classify relationships into types. Monkeys also use sounds to represent features of their environment and compare different vocalizations according to their meaning. However, while monkeys may use abstract concepts and have motives, beliefs, and desires, their mental states are apparently not accessible: they do not know what they know. In addition, monkeys seem unable to attribute mental states to others: they lack a "theory of mind." Their inability to examine their own mental states or to attribute mental states to others severely constrains their ability to transmit information or to deceive one another. It also limits the extent to which their vocalizations can be called semantic. Finally, the skills that monkeys exhibilt in social behavior are apparently domain specific. For reasons that are presently unclear, vervets exhibit adaptive specializations in social interactions that are not extended to their interactions with other species (although they should be).
Detection Theory is an introduction to one of the most important tools for analysis of data where choices must be made and performance is not perfect. Originally developed for evaluation of electronic detection, detection theory was adopted by psychologists as a way to understand sensory decision making, then embraced by students of human memory. It has since been utilized in areas as diverse as animal behavior and X-ray diagnosis. This book covers the basic principles of detection theory, with separate initial chapters on measuring detection and evaluating decision criteria. Some other features include: complete tools for application, including flowcharts, tables, pointers, and software;. student-friendly language;. complete coverage of content area, including both one-dimensional and multidimensional models;. separate, systematic coverage of sensitivity and response bias measurement;. integrated treatment of threshold and nonparametric approaches;. an organized, tutorial level introduction to multidimensional detection theory;. popular discrimination paradigms presented as applications of multidimensional detection theory; and. a new chapter on ideal observers and an updated chapter on adaptive threshold measurement. This up-to-date summary of signal detection theory is both a self-contained reference work for users and a readable text for graduate students and other researchers learning the material either in courses or on their own. © 2005 by Lawrence Erlbaum Associates, Inc. All rights reserved.
Sixteen domestic dogs (Canis familiaris) and four horses (Equus caballus) were tested for their ability to use human-given manual and facial cues in an object-choice task. Two of the four horses
used touch as a cue and one horse successfully used pointing. The performance of the dogs was considerably better, with 12
subjects able to use pointing as a cue, 4 able to use head orientation and 2 able to use eye gaze alone. Group analysis showed
that the dogs performed significantly better in all experimental conditions than during control trials. Dogs were able to
use pointing cues even when the cuer’s body was closer to the incorrect object. Working gundogs with specialised training
used pointing more successfully than pet dogs and gundog breeds performed better than non-gundog breeds. The results of this
experiment suggest that animals’ use of human given communicative signals depends on cognitive ability, the evolutionary consequences
of domestication and enculturation by humans within the individual’s lifetime.
Play signals are known to function in the solicitation and maintenance of intraspecific play, but their role in interspecific play is relatively unstudied. We carried out two studies to examine interspecific signalling when humans play with domestic dogs, Canis familiaris. In the first, we recorded dog–owner play sessions on video to identify actions used by 21 dog owners to initiate play with their dogs. Thirty-five actions were each used by three or more owners. These included postures, vocalizations and physical contact with the dog. The actions varied greatly in their apparent success at instigating play which was, surprisingly, unrelated to the frequency with which they were used. We then did an experiment to determine the effect of composites of commonly used signals upon the behaviour of 20 Labrador retrievers. The performance of both ‘Bow’ and ‘Lunge’ by a human altered the subsequent behaviour of the dogs. Both signals caused increases in play, and Lunge produced significant increases in play bout frequency and mean bout duration. The efficiency of both these postural signals was enhanced when they were accompanied by play vocalizations. Thus, specific actions used by humans do communicate a playful context to dogs and can be described as interspecific play signals.
Ravens, Corvus corax, yell when they approach rich but defended food sources. As in other species, such food-associated calls attract conspecifics. These calls may provide information about the sender, such as its behaviour or motivation, and about the type of stimuli to which the caller is responding, such as the location, quality or quantity of a food source. We investigated whether yells convey information about different types and amounts of food. We experimentally exposed a group of free-ranging ravens foraging in a game park near Grünau, Austria to six feeding situations. Food of one of three types (meat, kitchen leftovers, wild boar chow) and either of two quantities (one or three buckets) was shown to the ravens 10 min before they could gain access to it during the feeding of wild boars, Sus scrofa. Ravens responded to the sight of food with one type of yell, the long haa call. Haa calling rates varied with the type but not with the amount of food, and decreased during feeding. Although juveniles produced long yells (chii calls) in response to food they changed the context of calling with increasing independence from their parents. Ravens gave short ‘who’ yells when approaching the food. Who calling was thus not affected by the sight of food but by the feeding situation in general. This is comparable to other calls given in a foraging context, such as appeasement and intimidation calls. The different use of long and short yells relative to food availability suggests that who calls provide information about the caller, such as its behaviour at food, whereas haa calls may also provide information about the food itself. Our data are consistent with the idea that haa calls are functionally referential.
Ten domestic dogs (Canis familiaris) of different breeds and ages were exposed to 2 different social cues indicating the location of hidden food, each provided by both a human informant and a conspecific informant (for a total of 4 different social cues). For the local enhancement cue, the informant approached the location where food was hidden and then stayed beside it. For the gaze and point cue, the informant stood equidistant between 2 hiding locations and bodily oriented and gazed toward the 1 in which food was hidden (the human informant also pointed). Eight of the 10 subjects, including the one 6-month-old juvenile, were above chance with 2 or more cues. Results are discussed in terms of the phylogenetic and ontogenetic processes by means of which dogs come to use social cues to locate food.
Thesis (Ph. D.)--University of Southampton, 1997.
Feline isolation calls were analyzed, and a model was developed to relate the acoustical features of these calls to the physical processes used in their production. Fifty isolation calls were recorded from each of five cats for a total sample of 250 vocalizations. By combinations of Fourier transform, autocorrelation, and linear prediction methods, the fundamental frequency (glottal-pulse period) F0, the energy of F0, the frequency having maximum energy Fmax (not always F0), and the energy at this frequency were computed. Mean F0 ranged from 400-600 Hz for individual cats. For some cats F0 was consistent within calls, but for other cats sudden shifts in F0 occurred within calls. Here, Fmax was almost a harmonic of F0 and generally ranged from 1-2 kHz. For individual cats, the energy ratio E = (energy of Fmax/energy of F0) varied from 1 to 60 and the grand average E over the time course of the call varied from about 12 to 38. The mean rms call intensity was an inverted-U function of time. Measured jaw opening was strongly correlated with acoustical features of call. A Bessel-horn model with time-varying flare gave a good account of acoustical parameters such as Fmax. The presence of formantlike resonances in cat vocalizations and the important role of jaw movements (vocal gestures) in the production of these calls suggest that cats may provide a useful model for some aspects of human vocal behavior.
Male chickens, Gallus gallus domesticus, usually produce characteristic 'food' calls upon discovering edible objects, and are more likely to do so in the presence of a hen. Food calling is thus dependent upon food and modulated by social context, which is consistent with the idea that hens respond because they anticipate a feeding opportunity. An alternative model suggests that female behaviour is not mediated by the predicted presence of food but rather by social information, such as a low probability of male aggression. We conducted two playback experiments to explore the type of information encoded in food-associated vocal signals. Isolated hens were played recorded food calls and we compared their responses with those evoked by ground alarm calls (which have similar acoustic characteristics) and by contact calls (which are produced under similar social circumstances). Hens responded to food call playbacks by fixating downwards with the frontal binocular field. This anticipatory feeding movement was specific to food calls and did not occur in either of the control conditions. Food calls also affected looking downwards selectively. There were no differences between the call types in their effects on social behaviour, such as approach and contact calling, nor were there differences in the nonspecific effects of sound playback, such as orienting towards the loudspeaker or increased locomotor activity. Chicken food calls appear to provide conspecifics with information about the presence of food. This property has not hitherto been demonstrated in any natural system of animal acoustic signals. Copyright 1999 The Association for the Study of Animal Behaviour.
No meaning required: Abandoning the search for a language grail in animal communication
- D Rendall
- M J Owren
Rendall, D., & Owren, M. J. (2001). No meaning required: Abandoning the search for a language grail in animal communication. Manuscript submitted for publication.
Domestication and history of the cat The domestic cat: The biology of its behaviour (pp. 179 –192). Cambridge, England: Cambridge University The effects of articulation on the acoustical structure of feline vocalizations
- J A Serpell
Serpell, J. A. (2000). Domestication and history of the cat. In D. C. Turner & P. Bateson (Eds.), The domestic cat: The biology of its behaviour (pp. 179 –192). Cambridge, England: Cambridge University. Shipley, C., Carterette, E. C., & Buchwald, J. S. (1991). The effects of articulation on the acoustical structure of feline vocalizations. Journal of the Acoustical Society of America, 89, 902–909.
Sound format conversion software [Com-puter software Primate cognition
- B Tice
- T M Carrell
- J Call
Tice, B., & Carrell, T. (2002). Sound format conversion software [Com-puter software]. Retrieved from http://hush.unl.edu/LabResources.html Tomasello, M., & Call, J. (1997). Primate cognition. New York: Oxford University.
Animal communication: Affect or cognition?
- P Marler
Marler, P. (1984). Animal communication: Affect or cognition? In K. R. Scherer & P. Ekman (Eds.), Approaches to emotion (pp. 345–365).
The behavior of communicating, after twenty years Perspectives in ethology Comprehension of human communicative signs in pet dogs. (Canis familiaris)
- W J Smith
Smith, W. J. (1997). The behavior of communicating, after twenty years. In D. H. Owings, M. D. Beecher, & N. K. Thompson (Eds.), Perspectives in ethology: Vol. 12. Communication (pp. 7–53). New York: Plenum. Soproni, K., Mikló, A ´., Topá, J., & Csá, V. (2001). Comprehension of human communicative signs in pet dogs. (Canis familiaris). Journal of Comparative Psychology, 115, 122–126.
Praat (Version 4) [Computer software and manual The signaling repertoire of the domestic cat and its undomesticated relatives The domestic cat: The biology of its behaviour The social behaviour of neutered domestic cats Food calling in ravens: Are yells referential signals
- P Boersma
- D Weenink
- J W S Bradshaw
- C L Cameron-Beaumont
Boersma, P., & Weenink, D. (2001). Praat (Version 4) [Computer software and manual]. Retrieved from http://www.fon.hum.uva.nl/praat/ Bradshaw, J. W. S., & Cameron-Beaumont, C. L. (2000). The signaling repertoire of the domestic cat and its undomesticated relatives. In D. C. Turner & P. Bateson (Eds.), The domestic cat: The biology of its behaviour (2nd ed., pp. 67–93). Cambridge, England: Cambridge University. Brown, S. L. (1993). The social behaviour of neutered domestic cats. Unpublished doctoral dissertation, University of Southhampton, England. Bugnyar, T., Kijne, M., & Kotrschal, K. (2001). Food calling in ravens: Are yells referential signals? Animal Behaviour, 61, 949 –958.
Praat (Version 4) [Computer software and manual] Retrieved from http://www.fon.hum.uva.nl The signaling repertoire of the domestic cat and its undomesticated relatives The domestic cat: The biology of its behaviour
- P Boersma
- D Weenink
- J W S Bradshaw
- C L Cameron-Beaumont
Boersma, P., & Weenink, D. (2001). Praat (Version 4) [Computer software
and manual]. Retrieved from http://www.fon.hum.uva.nl/praat/
Bradshaw, J. W. S., & Cameron-Beaumont, C. L. (2000). The signaling
repertoire of the domestic cat and its undomesticated relatives. In D. C.
Turner & P. Bateson (Eds.), The domestic cat: The biology of its
behaviour (2nd ed., pp. 67–93). Cambridge, England: Cambridge
University.
The social behaviour of neutered domestic cats. Unpublished doctoral dissertation
- S L Brown
Brown, S. L. (1993). The social behaviour of neutered domestic cats.
Unpublished doctoral dissertation, University of Southhampton,
England.