ArticleNature communications2016
The evolution of acoustic size exaggeration in terrestrial mammals.
Article in Nature communications, 2016. The graph could read no effect estimate from its abstract, so it casts no vote on the map. Cited by 59 papers, 1 of them a synthesis that pooled it.
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Who cites it
59 citing papers in PubMed, 1 synthesis or guideline pooled it, 150 citations in OpenAlex.
- Rethinking the frequency code: a meta-analytic review of the role of acoustic body size in communicative phenomena.Philosophical transactions of the Royal Society of London. Series B, Biological sciences · 2021Pooled it
- Phylogenomic analysis of vocal fold length evolution reveals links between vocal and auditory systems in terrestrial mammals.Molecular biology and evolution · 2026Article
- Acoustic Analysis of Vocalizations in Malinois Dogs: Context-Associated Variation in Fundamental Frequency, Harmonic-to-Noise Ratio, and Formants.Veterinary sciences · 2026Article
- Behaviour and vocalization of Mongolian gazelle (Procapra gutturosa) in rutting harems considering the sex-specific vocal anatomy.Die Naturwissenschaften · 2026Article
- Sex differences in giant panda paw preferences during bamboo feeding.Learning & behavior · 2026Article
- Call variation and calling site preference of three sympatricCurrent zoology · 2025Article
- Formant analysis of vertebrate vocalizations: achievements, pitfalls, and promises.BMC biology · 2025Review
- Global analysis of acoustic frequency characteristics in birds.Proceedings. Biological sciences · 2024Article
- Dog-human vocal interactions match dogs' sensory-motor tuning.PLoS biology · 2024Article
- A practical guide to calculating vocal tract length and scale-invariant formant patterns.Behavior research methods · 2024Article
- Species recognition and the divergences in the chemical and ultrasonic signals between two coexistingCurrent zoology · 2024Article
- Sex Differences in Cochlear Transcriptomes in Horseshoe Bats.Animals : an open access journal from MDPI · 2024Article
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- Vocal tract shape variation contributes to individual vocal identity in African penguins.Proceedings. Biological sciences · 2023Article
- Group size and mating system predict sex differences in vocal fundamental frequency in anthropoid primates.Nature communications · 2023Article
- Crossmodal association between visual and acoustic cues in a tortoise (Biology letters · 2023Article
- Beyond Broca: neural architecture and evolution of a dual motor speech coordination system.Brain : a journal of neurology · 2023Article
- Coevolution of social and communicative complexity in lemurs.Philosophical transactions of the Royal Society of London. Series B, Biological sciences · 2022Article
- Sound Visualization Demonstrates Velopharyngeal Coupling and Complex Spectral Variability in Asian Elephants.Animals : an open access journal from MDPI · 2022Article
Corrections and comments
PubMed lists nothing against this paper. Absence here is not a guarantee, only a check that was made.
Authors and funding
2 authors at 2 institutions in 2 countries.
Funding
No grant is acknowledged in the PubMed record.
Abstract
Recent studies have revealed that some mammals possess adaptations that enable them to produce vocal signals with much lower fundamental frequency (F0) and formant frequency spacing (ΔF) than expected for their size. Although these adaptations are assumed to reflect selection pressures for males to lower frequency components and exaggerate body size in reproductive contexts, this hypothesis has not been tested across a broad range of species. Here we show that male terrestrial mammals produce vocal signals with lower ΔF (but not F0) than expected for their size in mating systems with greater sexual size dimorphism. We also reveal that males produce calls with higher than expected F0 and ΔF in species with increased sperm competition. This investigation confirms that sexual selection favours the use of ΔF as an acoustic size exaggerator and supports the notion of an evolutionary trade-off between pre-copulatory signalling displays and sperm production.
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Registered trials
Read under generation 80e0d062 · epoch 390. Bibliography from PubMed, PubMed Central and OpenAlex; grants from NIH RePORTER; trial links from ClinicalTrials.gov; estimates, votes and beliefs from the OpenQuestion graph.