ArticleRoyal Society open science2024
Vocal complexity in a socially complex corvid: gradation, diversity and lack of common call repertoire in male rooks.
Article in Royal Society open science, 2024. The graph could read no effect estimate from its abstract, so it casts no vote on the map. Cited by 11 papers.
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Who cites it
11 citing papers in PubMed.
- A beta way: A tutorial on Bayesian beta regression for psychological research.Behavior research methods · 2026Article
- Investigating the structure of the greylag goose vocal repertoire: what can unsupervised methods tell us?Scientific reports · 2026Article
- Editorial: vocal communication in corvids.Animal cognition · 2026Article
- Rooks (Corvus frugilegus) can show spontaneous vocal flexibility when exposed to dynamically changing rhythmic sounds.Animal cognition · 2026Article
- Animals as Communication Partners: Ethics and Challenges in Interspecies Language Research.Animals : an open access journal from MDPI · 2026Review
- Challenges and new opportunities in deciphering the meaning of corvid call sequences.Animal cognition · 2025Review
- Capturing vocal communication in a free-living corvid: high-resolution data from low-impact miniaturized tags.Animal cognition · 2025Article
- Can an old rook learn new tricks? Vocal command comprehension and obedience in rooks (Corvus frugilegus).Animal cognition · 2025Article
- Vocal efficiency in crows.Animal cognition · 2025Article
- Exploring Neural Dynamics in the Auditory Telencephalon of Crows Using Functional Ultrasound Imaging.The Journal of neuroscience : the official journal of the Society for Neuroscience · 2025Article
- Vocal complexity in a socially complex corvid: gradation, diversity and lack of common call repertoire in male rooks.Royal Society open science · 2024Article
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Authors and funding
6 authors.
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Abstract
Vocal communication is widespread in animals, with vocal repertoires of varying complexity. The social complexity hypothesis predicts that species may need high vocal complexity to deal with complex social organization (e.g. have a variety of different interindividual relations). We quantified the vocal complexity of two geographically distant captive colonies of rooks, a corvid species with complex social organization and cognitive performances, but understudied vocal abilities. We quantified the diversity and gradation of their repertoire, as well as the inter-individual similarity at the vocal unit level. We found that males produced call units with lower diversity and gradation than females, while song units did not differ between sexes. Surprisingly, while females produced highly similar call repertoires, even between colonies, each individual male produced almost completely different call repertoires from any other individual. These findings question the way male rooks communicate with their social partners. We suggest that each male may actively seek to remain vocally distinct, which could be an asset in their frequently changing social environment. We conclude that inter-individual similarity, an understudied aspect of vocal repertoires, should also be considered as a measure of vocal complexity.
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