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      Vocal correlates of sender-identity and arousal in the isolation calls of domestic kitten ( Felis silvestris catus)

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          Abstract

          Introduction

          Human speech does not only communicate linguistic information but also paralinguistic features, e.g. information about the identity and the arousal state of the sender. Comparable morphological and physiological constraints on vocal production in mammals suggest the existence of commonalities encoding sender-identity and the arousal state of a sender across mammals. To explore this hypothesis and to investigate whether specific acoustic parameters encode for sender-identity while others encode for arousal, we studied infants of the domestic cat ( Felis silvestris catus). Kittens are an excellent model for analysing vocal correlates of sender-identity and arousal. They strongly depend on the care of their mother. Thus, the acoustical conveyance of sender-identity and arousal may be important for their survival.

          Results

          We recorded calls of 18 kittens in an experimentally-induced separation paradigm, where kittens were spatially separated from their mother and siblings. In the Low arousal condition, infants were just separated without any manipulation. In the High arousal condition infants were handled by the experimenter. Multi-parametric sound analyses revealed that kitten isolation calls are individually distinct and differ between the Low and High arousal conditions. Our results suggested that source- and filter-related parameters are important for encoding sender-identity, whereas time-, source- and tonality-related parameters are important for encoding arousal.

          Conclusion

          Comparable findings in other mammalian lineages provide evidence for commonalities in non-verbal cues encoding sender-identity and arousal across mammals comparable to paralinguistic cues in humans. This favours the establishment of general concepts for voice recognition and emotions in humans and animals.

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          Most cited references58

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          Vocal affect expression: a review and a model for future research.

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            Thinking the voice: neural correlates of voice perception.

            The human voice is the carrier of speech, but also an "auditory face" that conveys important affective and identity information. Little is known about the neural bases of our abilities to perceive such paralinguistic information in voice. Results from recent neuroimaging studies suggest that the different types of vocal information could be processed in partially dissociated functional pathways, and support a neurocognitive model of voice perception largely similar to that proposed for face perception.
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              Calls out of chaos: the adaptive significance of nonlinear phenomena in mammalian vocal production

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                Author and article information

                Journal
                Front Zool
                Front. Zool
                Frontiers in Zoology
                BioMed Central
                1742-9994
                2012
                21 December 2012
                : 9
                : 36
                Affiliations
                [1 ]Institute of Zoology, University of Veterinary Medicine Hannover, Bünteweg 17, Hannover D-30559, Germany
                [2 ]Institute for Laboratory Animal Science, Hannover Medical School, Carl-Neuberg-Straße 1, Hannover D-30626, Germany
                Article
                1742-9994-9-36
                10.1186/1742-9994-9-36
                3551667
                23259698
                05645017-e1bc-4c2a-9333-c42a785132eb
                Copyright ©2012 Scheumann et al.; licensee BioMed Central Ltd.

                This is an Open Access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License ( http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/2.0), which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original work is properly cited.

                History
                : 29 August 2012
                : 7 December 2012
                Categories
                Research

                Animal science & Zoology
                affect-intensity,individual signature,infant,mammal,cat,vocalisation
                Animal science & Zoology
                affect-intensity, individual signature, infant, mammal, cat, vocalisation

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