Study finds whale song structured like language

JERUSALEM — An international study, led by Israeli and British researchers, has found that whale song has a structure similar to human language, the Hebrew University of Jerusalem said in a statement on Sunday.

Published in the academic journal Science, the new study explored the connection between human language — characterized by recurring elements following specific frequency patterns — and the intricate, culturally transmitted songs of humpback whales.

The research team, composed of linguists, developmental scientists, marine biologists, and behavioral ecologists, analyzed eight years of humpback whale song data collected in New Caledonia, located in the southwest Pacific Ocean.

By applying methods inspired by how human infants learn words, they identified statistical structures in whale songs akin to those found in human languages.

Notably, researchers detected recurring elements in the whale song that followed a skewed frequency, a feature previously unseen in any nonhuman animal.

Furthermore, the study found that humpback whales, like human babies, may learn their songs by tracking probabilities between sound elements and using dips in those probabilities to segment the song.

The findings pointed to a deep similarity between whales and humans, both of which use culturally transmitted communication systems.

It also highlighted the potential of studying convergent evolution to better understand the evolution of language, not only through primates but across a broader range of species.

Xinhua