A recent study by Stony Brook University postdoctoral fellow Mason Youngblood revealed the complex efficiency of whale communication, which follows similar linguistic laws to many human languages.
Youngblood is a researcher at Stony Brook’s Institute for Advanced Computational Science, where he studies animal communication and cultural evolution.
For his research into whale communication, Youngblood conducted a meta analysis, compiling existing data from previous research of different whale species.
Through the comparison of the communication methods of 16 different whale species with 51 different human languages, ranging from European to indigenous, Youngblood found some of these species’ communication closely followed Menzerath’s law and Zipf’s law.
Menzerath’s law and Zipf’s law are two linguistic laws that are often used to measure the efficiency of a language through vocalization time. Menzerath’s law states that longer vocal sequences consist of shorter elements, while Zipf’s law of abbreviations asserts that frequently used elements tend to have shorter durations. These two laws, while not present in all human languages, do appear in the vast majority of human languages.
An important point to note is that while these different whale communications follow similar linguistic rules to human language, it does not mean they are exactly the same as a language.
“There’s no form of whale communication that we would call a language,” Youngblood said. “They use sounds to communicate, but the kind of information that they convey is not the same kind of information that we convey in a language.”
Some species of whale, such as humpback and bowhead whales, may communicate with one another through songs. Meanwhile, sperm whales use clicks to indicate what community they’re a part of. Other species, such as dolphins, will communicate in clicks and whistles to coordinate together in hunting, foraging, play and to assign names.
While humans and whales may not be able to have a conversation with one another, this discovery still has significant implications on non-human communication.
The study also found that some of the whale species, such as the humpback whale, exhibited these linguistic laws more strongly and frequently than human languages do.
“That might point to some kind of differences between vocalizing underwater versus on air,” Youngblood said. “If you are vocalizing underwater, you’re basically singing while holding your breath, […] so efficiency might be a lot more important.”
Along with further examination of whale communication, Youngblood hopes his research will inspire further examination into the linguistic levels of communication among animals that are often overlooked in the discussion of complex non-human communication.
“People are starting to explore these in the vocalizations of frogs and the vocalizations of bats and all of these other species that produce complex vocalizations,” Youngblood said.
On the topic of these linguistic laws, Youngblood suggests that a different perspective may be needed, one that sees that these laws might explain more about communication and its evolution than just human language.
“Some properties of language are probably very, very ancient,” Youngblood said. “So features like Menzerath’s law — that’s the main linguistics law I looked at — may be as old as communication itself.”
Menzerath’s law helps predict how communication systems could be optimized to convey as much information as possible with the least amount of effort, Youngblood explained.
Zipf’s law, although more mysterious than Menzerath’s law, may be more closely related to culture and learning. It often emerges only after the creation of a complex communication system that’s passed down from generation to generation.
“If we find these kinds of features so broadly outside of human language, I think they tell us more about communication more broadly than they do about language,” Youngblood said.
