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Age- and Sex-Related Variations in Clear Calls of Papio ursinus

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Abstract

Changes in vocalizations during ontogeny can in principle be related to three factors: growth, maturation, and experience, i.e., learning. While learning is a prerequisite for the proper development of speech, it hardly appears to play a role in the development of the species-typical vocal behavior of nonhuman primates. Nonetheless, subjects of different age and sex often exhibit prominent variation in the structure of their vocalizations. We investigated ontogenetic changes and the emergence of sex-related differences in the acoustic structure of Chacma baboon (Papio ursinus) clear calls. We recorded the vocalizations emitted by individuals separated from the rest of the group or from particular individuals, in a group of baboons in the Moremi Wildlife Reserve, Botswana. We analyzed calls from 58 baboons of both sexes and all age classes. While the structure of the call appeared to be fixed from birth, call duration, the distribution of energy, and the fundamental frequency of the calls, including modulation, varied with age and sex of the caller. We discuss how body size may explain the variations. Some of the variables exhibited a different profile of variation with age between the sexes, with significant differences becoming apparent around puberty. The emergence of these sexual differences may be explained by the onset of sexual dimorphism in body size and mass. To which degree the hormonal status contributes to variation in the calling remains to be investigated.

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Acknowledgements

We thank the Office of the President and the Department of Wildlife of the Republic of Botswana for permission to conduct research in the Moremi Wildlife Reserve. We are grateful to the anonymous reviewer who provided helpful comments on the manuscript. This research was supported by the Deutsche Forschungsgemeinschaft (Fi 707/2) and the Conseil Régional d’Alsace. We would like to dedicate this research to our former field assistant Mokupi Mokupi who died recently.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Research Group Cognitive Ethology, German Primate Centre, Kellnerweg 4, 37077, Göttingen, Germany

    Elodie Ey, Kurt Hammerschmidt & Julia Fischer

  2. Department of Psychology, University of Pennsylvania, Philadelphia, PA, USA

    Robert M. Seyfarth

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  1. Elodie Ey
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  2. Kurt Hammerschmidt
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  3. Robert M. Seyfarth
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  4. Julia Fischer
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Correspondence to Elodie Ey.

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Ey, E., Hammerschmidt, K., Seyfarth, R.M. et al. Age- and Sex-Related Variations in Clear Calls of Papio ursinus . Int J Primatol 28, 947–960 (2007). https://doi.org/10.1007/s10764-007-9139-3

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  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s10764-007-9139-3

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