Bottlenose dolphins can use learned vocal labels to address each other

Wild bottlenose dolphins were played synthetic versions of their own signature whistle — stripped of voice features so only the frequency pattern remained — alongside signature whistles of familiar and unfamiliar animals.

Studied in

Tursiops truncatus

Sample size

wild dolphin groups tested with playback

Dolphins responded to their own synthetic signature whistle by calling back, and did not respond in the same way to the whistles of others. The response persisted when voice characteristics were removed.

• Response is measured as vocal reply; what the animal understands by the label is not established.
• Wild playback offers limited control over context and over who else is present.
• Sample sizes in wild cetacean playback work are necessarily small.

• Calling a dolphin by its own name, in somebody else’s voice

  When a dolphin hears its own signature whistle, is it recognising the whistle, or recognising the voice of whoever produced it?

• Animal communication

  Some animal calls point at specific things in the world, not just at how the caller feels

• Dolphins

  Each dolphin invents its own whistle, and others recognise it

• Do animals have language?

  Several animals have one or two of the things that make human language what it is. Nothing has been shown to have the whole set.

• Dolphins

  Each bottlenose dolphin develops its own whistle, others learn to copy it, and a dolphin answers when its own whistle is played back.