BEIJING, May 2 (Xinhuanet) -- How baby birds learn to
sing is just like how babies learn to talk, researchers reported in Friday's
edition of the journal Science.
Michale S. Fee at the Massachusetts Institute of
Technology studied the brains of baby zebra finches as the little birds learned
the unique song they would use as adults.
"Young birds learn their songs in a series of stages.
They start out just as humans do, by babbling," Fee said, while the adult bird
produces a very precise pattern of sound.
Like babies moving their limbs or trying to walk,
babbling emphasizes the importance of play activities in learning.
Indeed, Fee discovered that one part of the finch
brain produces song, while the babbling is controlled by a different part of the
brain.
"The parallels between human and bird language are
indeed striking," said psychology professor Bob McMurray of the University of
Iowa.
"This work illustrates that language learning
may operate by very general principles ... that can be seen across species as
different as finches and humans," added McMurray.
(Agencies)
