Most Attractive Sounds in Animals

You probably agree with the animals on which bird calls, frog noises and cricket chirps are most attractive.

Animals do all sorts of things to attract each other as potential mates. Many birds, for example, produce feathers with elaborate color patterns – from the iridescent plumage of many hummingbirds to the famously brilliant tail of a peacock. Charles Darwin, an early pioneer in the theory of evolution, saw these colors and concluded that they exist because other birds find them attractive.

But this raised a peculiar question: Why did Darwin himself find these colors beautiful too?

Indeed, he noted that some animals have “nearly the same taste for the beautiful as we have,” a simple observation with radical implications. Our sense of beauty might be something we humans share with other animals, rooted in biology.

Over a century after Darwin made his observations, my colleagues and I decided to actually test this idea.

I am an expert in animal communication, with a focus on sound production and perception. I have worked with species such as zebra finches, fringe-lipped bats and túngara frogs. For example, late at night in Panama, I have watched remote video feeds of female túngara frogs as they listened to calls that I played from different speakers. Eventually a female will hop toward one speaker, revealing which of the calls she preferred.

Could it really be possible that this tiny frog and I are attracted to some of the same sounds? What might shared preferences say about what animals and people have in common? We needed data to find out.

The post continues to part 2.

- Author: Logan S. James, The Conversation