title: What songbirds teach us about learning.
abstract: Bird fanciers have known for centuries that songbirds learn their songs. This learning has striking parallels to speech acquisition: like humans, birds must hear the sounds of adults during a sensitive period, and must hear their own voice while learning to vocalize. With the discovery and investigation of discrete brain structures required for singing, songbirds are now providing insights into neural mechanisms of learning. Aided by a wealth of behavioural observations and species diversity, studies in songbirds are addressing such basic issues in neuroscience as perceptual and sensorimotor learning, developmental regulation of plasticity, and the control and function of adult neurogenesis.
authors.affiliation: W.M Keck Center for Integrative Neuroscience, University of California, San Francisco 94143, USA. msb@phy.ucsf.edu
authors.forename: Michael S
authors.initials: MS
authors.lastname: Brainard
authors.forename: Allison J
authors.initials: AJ
authors.lastname: Doupe
mesh_terms: D000375:Aging / Q000502:physiology; D000818:Animals; D001303:Auditory Cortex / Q000166:cytology / Q000254:growth & development / Q000502:physiology; D005260:Female; D006309:Hearing / Q000502:physiology; D006801:Humans; D007858:Learning / Q000502:physiology*; D009044:Motor Cortex / Q000166:cytology / Q000254:growth & development / Q000502:physiology; D009473:Neuronal Plasticity; D016548:Prosencephalon / Q000166:cytology / Q000254:growth & development / Q000502:physiology*; D020308:Songbirds / Q000502:physiology*; D013569:Synapses / Q000502:physiology; D014828:Vocalization, Animal / Q000502:physiology*