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Apr. 29th, 2006 12:12 amThe Birds And The B's: Challenging Chomsky, Starlings Learn 'Human-only' Syntax Patterns (thanks, ![[livejournal.com profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/external/lj-userinfo.gif)
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The European starling -- long known as a virtuoso songbird and as an expert mimic too -- may also soon gain a reputation as something of a "grammar-marm."
This three-ounce bird, new research shows, can learn syntactic patterns formerly thought to be the exclusive province of humans.
Led by Timothy Q. Gentner, assistant professor of psychology at the University of California, San Diego, a study published in the April 27 issue of Nature demonstrates that starlings have the capacity to classify acoustic sequences defined by recursive, center-embedded grammars.
Recursive center-embedding refers to the common characteristic of human grammars that allows for the creation of new (and grammatically correct) utterances by inserting words and clauses within sentences -- theoretically, without limit. ( Read more... )
blue_lightning)The European starling -- long known as a virtuoso songbird and as an expert mimic too -- may also soon gain a reputation as something of a "grammar-marm."
This three-ounce bird, new research shows, can learn syntactic patterns formerly thought to be the exclusive province of humans.
Led by Timothy Q. Gentner, assistant professor of psychology at the University of California, San Diego, a study published in the April 27 issue of Nature demonstrates that starlings have the capacity to classify acoustic sequences defined by recursive, center-embedded grammars.
Recursive center-embedding refers to the common characteristic of human grammars that allows for the creation of new (and grammatically correct) utterances by inserting words and clauses within sentences -- theoretically, without limit. ( Read more... )