ANIMAL
COMMUNICATION

Małgorzata Szulc-Kurpaska

Bees’ communication

The dancing conveys info about location
of food source, its quality and its
distance from the hive.



food within 5 metres

- round dance



food within 5-20 metres

- sickle dance



food more than 20 metres

- tail wagging

dance

2

Birds’ communication



Calls – short bursts of sounds and simple

patterns of notes



Calls:



warn of predators



coordinate flocking and flight activity



express aggression



accompany nesting and feeding behaviour

3

Birds’ communication

4



Songs -

lengthy, elaborate patterns of

mostly

pitched sounds



to announce and delimit the territory



to attract a mate

Talking chimps

5



Washoe (ASL)



After 21 months she learned 34 words,
later crept to over 100



semanticity ‘a toothbrush’ (index finger
rubbed against her teeth), ‘more’



creativity gimme tickle ‘Come and tickle
me’ open food drink ‘Open the fridge’



no structure dependence sweet go go
sweet ‘Take me to the raspberry bushes’

Talking chimps

6



Sarah



She was taught to manipulate plastic tokens on
a magnetic board



If apple then banana (she took an apple to get a
reward of chocolate)



Simple slot-filling operations (hierarchical)

Sarah insert apple pail
Sarah insert banana dish
Sarah insert apple red dish
Sarah insert banana green dish

Talking chimps

7



Lana (1)



She was taught to press keys marking
with a symbol standing for a word



100 symbols



arbitrary symbols (geometric figures on
different coloured backgrounds)



semanticity a symbol refers to a type of
object not just a particular thing, e.g. more

Talking chimps



Lana (2)



creativity

-Put a ball into a bowl
-Tim put milk in machine
-’apple which is orange’
-’banana which is green’



Displacement – the ability to talk about
absent objects

8

Talking chimps



Lana (3)



She could carry simple slot-filling
exercises



Tim give Lana coffee



Tim give Lana juice



Machine give milk



Machine give coke

9

Talking gorilla



Koko (ASL)



Her intelligence was between 85-95



After 5 and a half years her working vcabulary
was 375 and her receptive vocabulary was
645 words



drawings of a hat, a spoon, a tree and a house



generalisation ’straw’ a drinking straw,
cigarettes, a plastic tube and radio antennae



creativity eye hat – ‘a mask’; white tiger –’a
zebra’

10

Talking chimps



Nim Chimsky (ASL)



Out of 20,000 two-sign combinations
1378 were different



78% had ‘more’ at the beginning more
tickle, more drink



83% had verb before the object tickle
Nim, hug Nim



More imitation when he grew older



No evidence of turn-taking

11

Talking chimps

12



Panbanisha



Keys on a computer that produces a synthetic voice
(400 keys)



She learned 3,000 words



Please can I have an iced coffee?



Panbanisha taught the skills to her 1-year old son
Nyota



She learned to write



Her mum Matata can’t use the keyboard so
Panbanisha translates for her: Matata wants a banana

Talking orangutan

13



Chantek



He learned 2,000 words



Please buy me a hamburger



The apes learned the symbols and then
constructed sentences by pressing the keys
in a specific order



The apes have the language and cognitive
skills of a 4-year ols child

Adaptations for speech in humans

14



the teeth



even in height and form an unbroken
barrier,



they are upright, not slanting outwards,



the top and bottom sets meet



the lips



small and narrow



they can open and shut rapidly



with intricate interlacing of muscles

Adaptations for speech in humans



the tongue



thick, muscular and mobile



may assume different positions in the oral
cavity



the larynx



simpler in structure than in other primates



streamlining and simplification

15

Adaptations for speech in humans

16



the lungs



breathing in is accelerated



breathing out is slowed down



the brain



heavier (300 grams at birth, 1000
grams at two years of age)



with more surface folding of the cortex

Adaptations for speech in humans

17



The difference between human and
chimp brains is a qualitative, not a
quantitative one.

Adaptations for speech in humans

18



The brain



The brain stem

-it controls breathing
-it controls heart beating



The cerebrum

-thought
-decision
-emotion
-character

Adaptations for speech in humans

19

Speech centre

Right handers

Left handers

Left hemisphere

90%

70-90%

Right hemisphere

10%

10-30%

Adaptations for speech in humans

20



The left hemisphere

-Broca’s area (speech production)
-Wernicke’s area (speech perception)

the left hemisphere is better at processing

linguistic signals



The right hemisphere



understanding jokes



understanding metaphors



Intonation



can name objects but cannot cope with syntax

Adaptations for speech in humans

21



Contralateral control of the brain and the
body



Ambidextrous people



Brain lateralisation
-specialisation of brain hemispheres into
different functions
-it coincides with the critical period for
language acquisition

Brain lateralisation

22



Even in foetuses some areas of the left
hemisphere are

bigger

than the right



In humans much more space is allotted
to the area controlling the

hands

and

mouth

.



Spatio-temporal intelligence are largely
independent of language and associated
with the

right

hemisphere.

Multiplicity of integrative processes

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In speech at least 3 processes are taking

place simultaneously:



sounds are actually being uttered;



phrases are being activated in their
phonetic form ready for use;



the rest of the sentence is being
planned.

Slajd z punktami



Punkt 1



Podpunkt (wcisnij tab zeby wciac)



Punkt 2 (kolejne punkty dodajesz
enterem)

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Slajd z punktami



Punkt 1



Podpunkt (wcisnij tab zeby wciac)



Punkt 2 (kolejne punkty dodajesz
enterem)

25

Slajd z punktami



Punkt 1



Podpunkt (wcisnij tab zeby wciac)



Punkt 2 (kolejne punkty dodajesz
enterem)

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Slajd z punktami



Punkt 1



Podpunkt (wcisnij tab zeby wciac)



Punkt 2 (kolejne punkty dodajesz
enterem)

27

Slajd z punktami



Punkt 1



Podpunkt (wcisnij tab zeby wciac)



Punkt 2 (kolejne punkty dodajesz
enterem)

28

Slajd z punktami



Punkt 1



Podpunkt (wcisnij tab zeby wciac)



Punkt 2 (kolejne punkty dodajesz
enterem)

29

Slajd z punktami



Punkt 1



Podpunkt (wcisnij tab zeby wciac)



Punkt 2 (kolejne punkty dodajesz
enterem)

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Tabelka

31

Wnioski



Język badanych nauczycieli zajął średnio 75%
czasu lekcji



Użycie języka obcego jest zróżnicowane od 6% do
94% języka nauczyciela



Nazywają obiekty z najbliższego otoczenia
wybrane do badania



Największą trudność sprawia dzieciom
samodzielne zaśpiewanie piosenki w języku
obcym



Dzieci rozumieją sens bajki czytanej bajki
pomimo nie czytają bajek w klasie

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Bibliografia



Allen, P., Frohlich, M. and Spada, N. 1984. The
Communicative Orientation of Language Teaching: An
Observation Scheme. Sydney: National Centre for
English Language Teaching and Research



Allwright, D. 1988. Observation in the Language
Classroom. London: Longman



Malamah – Thomas, A. 1987. Classroom Interaction.
Oxford: Oxford University Press



McKay, S. L. 2006. Researching Second Language
Classrooms. Oxon: Routledge



Moskowitz, G. 1976. The classroom interaction of
outstanding language teachers. Foreign Language
Annals 9/2

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Dziękuję za uwagę

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