ArticleThe Journal of neuroscience : the official journal of the Society for Neuroscience2012
Vocal exploration is locally regulated during song learning.
Article in The Journal of neuroscience : the official journal of the Society for Neuroscience, 2012. The graph could read no effect estimate from its abstract, so it casts no vote on the map. Cited by 30 papers.
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Who cites it
30 citing papers in PubMed.
- Estimating the motor exploration in reinforcement learning.iScience · 2026Article
- Learning the sound inventory of a complex vocal skill via an intrinsic reward.Science advances · 2024Article
- Article
- Generative models of birdsong learning link circadian fluctuations in song variability to changes in performance.PLoS computational biology · 2023Article
- Dopamine neurons evaluate natural fluctuations in performance quality.Cell reports · 2022Article
- A memory-driven auditory program ensures selective and precise vocal imitation in zebra finches.Communications biology · 2021Article
- What Is the Role of Thalamostriatal Circuits in Learning Vocal Sequences?Frontiers in neural circuits · 2021Article
- Inception of memories that guide vocal learning in the songbird.Science (New York, N.Y.) · 2019Article
- An automatic behavior recognition system classifies animal behaviors using movements and their temporal context.Journal of neuroscience methods · 2019Article
- Capacities and neural mechanisms for auditory statistical learning across species.Hearing research · 2019Review
- Experience-Dependent Intrinsic Plasticity During Auditory Learning.The Journal of neuroscience : the official journal of the Society for Neuroscience · 2019Article
- Language Origins Viewed in Spontaneous and Interactive Vocal Rates of Human and Bonobo Infants.Frontiers in psychology · 2019Article
- Songbirds work around computational complexity by learning song vocabulary independently of sequence.Nature communications · 2017Article
- The Role of Variability in Motor Learning.Annual review of neuroscience · 2017Review
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- Neural circuits. Inhibition protects acquired song segments during vocal learning in zebra finches.Science (New York, N.Y.) · 2016Article
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- Article
- Vocal learning in a social mammal: Demonstrated by isolation and playback experiments in bats.Science advances · 2015Article
- Behavior-linked FoxP2 regulation enables zebra finch vocal learning.The Journal of neuroscience : the official journal of the Society for Neuroscience · 2015Article
Corrections and comments
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Authors and funding
4 authors.
Funding
Abstract
Exploratory variability is essential for sensorimotor learning, but it is not known how and at what timescales it is regulated. We manipulated song learning in zebra finches to experimentally control the requirements for vocal exploration in different parts of their song. We first trained birds to perform a one-syllable song, and once they mastered it, we added a new syllable to the song model. Remarkably, when practicing the modified song, birds rapidly alternated between high and low acoustic variability to confine vocal exploration to the newly added syllable. Furthermore, even within syllables, acoustic variability changed independently across song elements that were only milliseconds apart. Analysis of the entire vocal output during learning revealed that the variability of each song element decreased as it approached the target, correlating with momentary local distance from the target and less so with the overall distance within a syllable. We conclude that vocal error is computed locally in subsyllabic timescales and that song elements can be learned and crystallized independently. Songbirds have dedicated brain circuitry for vocal babbling in the anterior forebrain pathway (AFP), which generates exploratory song patterns that drive premotor neurons at the song nucleus RA. We hypothesize that either AFP adjusts the gain of vocal exploration in fine timescales or that the sensitivity of RA premotor neurons to AFP/HVC inputs varies across song elements.
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Registered trials
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