In one of the largest learning differences observed between the sexes, a Yale researcher has found that female songbirds learn new songs 60% faster than male songbirds, increasing understanding of how hormones might affect learning.

"The results show that although female and male songbirds are both capable of learning songs, the timing of song acquisition is different depending on gender," says Ayako Yamaguchi, a research associate in the Department of Pharmacology at the School of Medicine. "These findings parallel subtle but consistent gender differences in human speech acquisition and offer an opportunity to study the biological basis of sexually distinct learning."

Published in the May 17 issue of Nature, the study compared development of songs in 30 male and female northern cardinals that were raised in an acoustically controlled environment for one year. Yamaguchi found that in northern cardinals, one of a few species in which both sexes sing, females learn a similar number of songs as males in less than one-third of the time. Yamaguchi also found that raising cardinals in isolation from conspecific songs lead males to improvise songs, while the same treatment made females essentially mute.

"These findings demonstrate one of the most substantial learning differences between male and female animals found to date," says Yamaguchi, who has long been interested in how male and female animals manage to produce sexually distinct vocalizations.

Vocal imitation is a rare learning skill that evolved only a few times in evolutionary history in humans, whales and birds. This skill allows animals to convert auditory information into motor output. To date, song learning in birds has been studied intensively as a model for understanding human speech acquisition, but very little had been known about song acquisition in female songbirds until now.

A young songbird listens to and memorizes adult songs during a sensitive phase early in life, and later practices its vocalizations until they match the memory formed earlier. To determine the sensitive phase of male and female cardinals, Yamaguchi raised 15 females and 11 males individually in an acoustically controlled environment and tutored them daily with tape-recorded cardinal songs for one year. All the birds heard 40 to 44 song types during that period. She found that the sensitive phase was longer in females than in males, although the number of songs acquired were the same, indicating that females memorized songs faster than males.

Yamaguchi, who is also affiliated with Columbia University, currently conducts research to identify how male and female vocalizations are generated by the central nervous system. This research is in collaboration with Leonard Kaczmarek, professor of pharmacology and physiology at Yale and Darcy Kelley in the Department of Biological Sciences at Columbia University.

-- By Karen Peart

T H I SW E E K ' SS T O R I E S

Financial manager Shen is newest alumni fellow

Six professors named to American Academy of Arts and Sciences

Researcher finds differences in how male, female cardinals learn to sing

Study shows most women are passive when faced with sexual harassment

ENDOWED PROFESSORSHIPS

• Political scientist Donald Green is Whitney Griswold Professor
  
  
• Geneticist Shirleen Roeder named Eugene Higgins Professor
  
  
• Buddhism scholar Stanley Weinstein is first Lex Hixon Professor
  

  
  

Whitney Humanities Center appoints its next leaders: Menocal and Thompson

Internationally known forestry expert will join the faculty

MEDICAL SCHOOL NEWS

• New non-invasive test detects Down syndrome in womb
  
  
• Researcher urges against 'one size fits all' approach in testing . . .
  
  
• Physical chemist from NYU is named chair of pharmacology
  
  
• EPH alumni make 'honor roll' for their public health careers
  

  
  

Study: Preschoolers can be unreliable as eye witnesses

SEC-inspired study finds investors lack information

Summer Cabaret begins season with trip to 'Valparaiso'

'Kiss Me Kate' creator recalled

Skeleton Crew

Hail, Hale!

OBITUARIES

• Richard French, musicologist who supported music libraries
  
  
• Noted pediatrician and children's advocate Richard Granger
  
  
• Jerome Myers, pioneer in the field of social psychiatry
  
  
• Yale coach Murray Murdoch, oldest-living National Hockey League Player
  

  
  

Campus Notes

---

Bulletin Home|Visiting on Campus|Calendar of Events|In the News|Bulletin Board

Yale Scoreboard|Classified Ads|Search Archives|Deadlines

Bulletin Staff|Public Affairs Home|News Releases| E-Mail Us|Yale Home Page

---