Singing parrots (and an opera singer) wanted for scientific research

“In order to follow a melodic line, you need to be able to tell the difference between two notes. We call this relative pitch, and it’s something humans excel at. Animals only hear the note that is something, so a C, A or F minor It’s an absolute pitch, something people can rarely do,” Spierings continues.

Zoom conversation with forty parrots

This led her to the following idea: “I think parrots may also have a relative pitch. Besides being a very musical species, they can make a lot of different sounds, as well as sing. We know that they probably have absolute height, but we also want to test relative hearing,” the scientist said.

Because there are no real parrots at the university, she decided to do some research through an app. “If a parrot can sing a song and we play it at a different pitch or interval, can the parrot still sing it? I can already see it: a big zoom conversation with forty parrots and their owners, with whom you really form a community,” Spierings dreams.

The scientist does not want to ask the research animals the impossible, explains the Leiden University website. “We also want to test the missions we give to parrots in humans. Because parrots sometimes make mistakes, but people do, of course. So if a professional opera singer can’t do certain missions “, we can’t do that for parrots. I’m very curious how many different versions of Mozart’s ‘Queen of the Night’ we’ll have collected next year.”

At the bottom of the noteworthy post is how interested owners of Singing Winged Wonders can get involved. report to the biologist.