Dolphins and parrots are known to address each other by mimicking the sounds they hear other members of their species make, but only humans are known to address each other using names they make up.
Intrigued to see if elephants might be doing this too, Michael Pardo and colleagues first studied 469 calls or ‘rumbles’ made by wild African elephants living in the Amboseli National Park and Samburu and Buffalo Springs National Reserves in Kenya.
The most common call was a harmonically rich, low frequency sound, unique to each individual. Each of the vocalisations had a known caller and a known receiver, and an algorithm was used to predict which of the sounds were potential names and which elephant they were likely to describe.
Next, the researchers played recordings of these ‘names’ to different elephants and found that elephants responded more enthusiastically to their own name than they did to the names of others. When they heard their name, they approached the speaker more quickly and responded more vocally. The finding suggests that elephants have specific vocalisations or ‘names’ for each other, and that they can recognise these names even when they occur out of context.
Name calling was more common when animals were communicating over long distances, the authors found, and also when adults were talking to their calves. Calves were less likely to use names than adults, suggesting that the ability to devise and use names is a skill that takes years to learn.
Elephants are smart creatures that live in complex social groups. They use sounds, sight, scent and touch to communicate with each other, and their calls are known to convey a rich stream of information, including details about age, sex, emotion and behavioural intent.
The ability to devise and link a sound with the identity of another animal suggests that elephants have a hitherto unappreciated depth of cognitive ability – they may be capable of abstract thought.
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