PSYCHOLINGUISTICS Animals and Language Learning

This paper is submintted to fulfill Psycholinguistics Group Assignment

Compiled by Annisa Septianing Tyas Didin Jamaludin Sayyidah Balqies Sitta Meinawati 7B

English Department Teachers Training and Education Faculty Sultan Ageng Tirtayasa University Serang-Banten 2013

PREFACE

Psycholinguistics is a branch of linguistic field which study about the language and the thought of the users of the language. In order to learn deeper about it, we should know in details about what is learned and how to learn about it. One of the things which is concerned in learning this subject is about animals and language learning. This paper is contained about the animals and language learning which tells about Animals and Language Learning. This paper is compiled and submitted to fulfil the group assignment of Psycholinguistics subject. Hopely, this paper is qualified enough with the criteria being given by the lecturer and this paper is very useful for our group for ourself study and could be useful for others. Our appreciation is given to our lecturer, Mrs. Rosmania Rima for taught us about the basic of Psycholinguistics and for all of our friends which are involved in helping to motivate us to work hard and keep our spirit high so this paper can be done as it is.

Writers Serang 08 October 2013

TABLE OF CONTENTS

PREFACE .............................................................................................................. 1 TABLE OF CONTENTS ....................................................................................... 2 CHAPTER I INTRODUCTION ............................................................................ 3 1.1. Background ..................................................................................................... 3 1.2. Identification of Problems ............................................................................... 3 1.3. Limitation of Problems ................................................................................... 4 1.4. Objectives ....................................................................................................... 4 CHAPTER II FRAME OF THEORIES ................................................................ 5 2.1. Teaching Speech to Apes ................................................................................ 5 2.2. Teaching Sign Language to Chimpanzee, Gorilla, and Orangutan ................ 5 2.3. Teaching Artificial Languages to Chimpanzees ............................................. 5 2.4. Teaching Language to Dolpin ......................................................................... 6 2.5. Teaching Spoken English to an African Grey Parrot ...................................... 7 2.6. Animal Communication in the Wild ............................................................... 7 CHAPTER III DISCUSSION ................................................................................. 9 3.1. Discussion ....................................................................................................... 9 3.2. Case Study .................................................................................................... 17 CHAPTER IV CONCLUSION ........................................................................... 20 REFERENCES .................................................................................................... 21

CHAPTER I INTRODUCTION

1.1. Background In animals, we know the parrot can imitate the sound and word of human language, but does the parrot understand the meaning what he speaks? Ape, Chimpanzee, Orangutan and Monkey, all of the primate animals are the most related in humans, so can they learn language? The animal language is more simple than human language, but human only can mimic the sound from animal, cannot understand the exactly communication which the animals produce. Human cannot learn the language of animals, but can animals learn human languages? Many researchers say that we can teach animals the social interaction and sensitive phases for language learning. That is, maybe the animals can be taught languages with some special ways and that is the point of our paper. This paper is about describing how the animals can produce the sound or learn language as human language. Then, the writers want to share how experts taught Ape, Chimpanzee, Orangutan and Parrot to learn human language, the success and its failure.

1.2. Identification of Problems The problems which can we identify in this paper are: 1. Is it possible to teach speech to Apes? 2. Could the researcher teach sign language to Gorilla, Orangutan and Chimpanzee? 3. How the researcher teach artificial languages to chimpanzee? 4. How to teach Dolphin a language? 5. Could the African Grey Parrot learn spoken english? 6. How is the animal communication in the wild?

1.3. Limitations of Problems The limitation of problems which discussed here is about the animals and language learning. 1.4. Objectives The objectives of this paper are 1. To know the possibility to teach speech to Apes. 2. To know whether Gorilla, Orangutan and Chimpanzee can learn language. 3. To know the probability to teach artificial languages to chimpanzee. 4. To know about how to teach language to a Dolphin. 5. To know about the teaching spoken language to an African Grey Parrot. 6. To know about animal communication in the wild.

CHAPTER II FRAME OF THEORIES

2.1 Definition of Animal Language Acoording to Pearce (1987) animal communication is the transmission of a signal from one animal to another such that the sender benefits, on average, from the response of the recipient. This definition permits the inclusion of many types of behavior and allows "communication" to be applied to a very large range of animals, including some very simple animals. 2.2 Kinds of Animal Communication There are some kinds of animal communication:

Chemical signals (used by some very simple creatures, including protozoa) Smell (related to chemical signals, eg. pheromones attract, skunk secretions repel) Touch Movement Posture (eg. dogs, geese) Facial gestures (eg. dogs snarling) Visual signals (eg. feathers) Sound (eg. very many vertebrate and invertebrate calls)

2.3. The Purpose of Animal Communication The purpose of animal communication are:

attract (especially mates) repel (especially competitors or enemies) signal aggression or submission advertise species warn of predators communicate about the environment or the availability of food

2.4 Features of Language Hocketts (1968) thirteen design features of language are considered particularly important in evaluating the question "can animals be taught language?" If any animal naturally possesses all the design feature of human language, then clearly that animal can talk. 1. Vocal-auditory channel: sounds emitted from the mouth and perceived by the auditory system. This applies to many animal communication systems, but there are many exceptions. Also, it does not apply to human sign language, which meets all the other 12 requirements. It also does not apply to written language. 2. Broadcast transmission and directional reception: this requires that the recipient can tell the direction that the signal comes from and thus the originator of the signal. 3. Rapid fading (transitory nature): Signal lasts a short time. This is true of all systems involving sound. It doesn't take into account audio recording technology and is also not true for written language. It tends not to apply to animal signals involving chemicals and smells which often fade slowly. 4. Interchangeability: All utterances that are understood can be produced. This is different to some communication systems where, for example, males produce one set of behaviours and females another and they are unable to interchange these messages so that males use the female signal and vice versa. 5. Total feedback: The sender of a message also perceives the message. That is, you hear what you say. This is not always true for some kinds of animal displays. 6. Specialisation: The signal produced is specialised for communication and is not the side effect of some other behaviour (eg. the panting of a dog incidentally produces the panting sound). 7. Semanticity: There is a fixed relationship between a signal and a meaning. 8. Arbitrariness: There is an arbitrary relationship between a signal and its meaning. That is, the signal, is related to the meaning by convention or by instinct but has no inherent relationship with the meaning. This can be seen in different words in different languages referring to the same meaning, or to different calls of different sub-species of a single bird species having the same meaning. 9. Discreteness: Language can be said to be built up from discrete units (eg. phonemes in human language). Exchanging such discrete units causes a change in the meaning

of a signal. This is an abrupt change, rather than a continuous change of meaning (eg. "cat" doesn't gradually change in meaning to "bat", but changes abruptly in meaning at some point. Speech loudness and pitch can, on the other hand be changed continuously without abrupt changes of meaning. 10. Displacement: Communicating about things or events that are distant in time or space. Bee dancing is an example of this. 11. Productivity: Language is an open system. We can potentially produce an infinite (2) number of different messages by combining the elements differently. This is not a feature of, for example, the calls of gibbons who have a finite number of calls and thus a closed system of communication. 12. Traditional transmission: Each generation needs to learn the system of communication from the preceding generation. Many species produce the same uniform calls regardless of where they live in the range (even a range spanning several continents). Such systems can be assumed to be defined by instinct and thus by genetics. Some animals, on the other hand fail to develop the calls of their species when raised in isolation. 13. Duality of patterning: Large numbers of meaningful signals (eg. morphemes or words) produced from a small number of meaningless units (eg. phonemes). Human language is very unusual in this respect. Apes, for example, do not share this feature in their natural communication systems.

CHAPTER III DISCUSSION

3.1. Discussion It seems well established based on our discussion in second chapter that no animal communication system fulfils all of the criteria outlined by Hockett (1968). This is certainly true for the apes. It is also true for most other species such as parrots and dolphins that have a complex communication system which involves a complex combination of various sounds. Why try to teach a human-like language to another species? Just because a species doesn't have such a communication system in the wild doesn't necessarily prove that they are incapable of using one. What kind of language should we teach these animals? We must avoid using features of human language that are physiologically difficult or impossible for the animal to manage. For example, spoken human language is extremely difficult or impossible for most animals because of the structure of their vocal organs. Apes, for example, can't produce a large proportion of the vowels and would have difficulty with some of the consonants. This may be due not only to the shapes of the vocal organs but also to the limitations of the motor centres in the brain that control these organs. We might attempt, on the other hand, to teach apes language that involves them using their hands (eg. sign language or the manipulation of symbols). Some birds, such as certain parrots and the Indian Hill Mynah, are able to mimic human speech with great clarity. We could, therefore, attempt to teach such animal spoken human language. Dolphins cannot be taught either type of language but may be able to understand sounds or gestures and to respond by pressing specially designed levers.

3.2 Case Study Teaching Speech to Apes a. Orangutan The earliest-known scientific attempt at teaching language to an ape was that of Funess (1916) in USA, who attempted to teach an orangutan to speak. The project ended in tragedy, the animal died with a high fever while repeating the two words (papa and cup) it had leaned to say. b. Gua: The Chimp Raised with a Human Sibling Winthrop and LuellaKellogg raised a female chimp named Gua along with their own son, Donald. Their idea was that by giving the chimpanzee the same input and sosial interaction as human child, the chimpanzee would learn language in the same way as human child learn its first language. After 16 months of age, and over the period ofnine months during which she was with the family, Gua learned to respond appropriately to 95 words, phrases, and sentences. c. Viki : Another Chimp Raised in Human Household Keith and Cathrenine raised a baby female chimp which called Viki. They teach Viki 4 words (mama, papa, up, and cup). After 6 years, Viki can utter those words but she just imitate the couch and oly want to say if she got reward (food or drinks).

Teaching Sign Language to the Chimpanzee, Gorilla and Orangutan a. Washoe : The First Signing Chimp Caught in the wild and received by the Gardners when she was between 8 and 14 months. Chimps are completely dependent until two years of age, and semi-dependent until the age of four. Full adult growth is reached between 12 and 16 years. The Gardeners tried to make Washoe's environment as similar as possible to a [deaf] human infant. Many helpers were used. There was always somebody in attendance during Washoe's waking hours. Every helper communicated with Washoe by using ASL (American Sign Language), rather than with the spoken voice (the use of which was minimised). Helper's acted as friends and companions to Washoe, making use of various games and activities to make the learning experience enjoyable. Methods: a) Imitation

As with chimpanzees in general, Washoe naturally imitated. Washoe signed the sign for 'toothbrush' spontaneously upon entering the Gardener's bathroom and noticing toothbrushes. There seems to have been no obvious motive, except to communicate. b) Babbling 'Babbling' here does not mean vocal babbling, rather the untaught signs used by Washoe to communicate a desire. Washoe used a begging gesture, which was not too different from the ASL signs for 'give me' and 'come'. c) Instrumental conditioning Humans could not learn a language, purely by instrumental conditioning, although it seems likely that the 'trick vocabulary' of early childhood could be acquired in this way. Instrumental conditioning was one strategy used with Washoe. Tickling was used as a reward. The sign for 'more' was learnt by instrumental conditioning. This sign was later applied to a variety of relevant situations. Results A Sign was added to a checklist when reported by three independent observers. The sign had to occur in an appropriate context and without prompting. The checklist was used to record the frequency of a sign. A sign had to be used at least once a day for 15 consecutive days, before it was deemed to have been acquired. Alternatively a sign had to be used at least 15 days out of 30 consecutive days. By the end of the 22nd month of the project, thirty-four signs had been learnt by Washoe. And ther, after three years old Washoe can express 132 sign words. b. Sarah In the year after Project Washoe began, David Premack started an experiment with a different kind of language. The above-mentioned plastic tokens are those which Premack used to train a chimpanzee named Sarah. These tokens represented words, and varied in shape, size, texture, and colour. Sentences were formed by placing the tokens in a vertical line (an orientation which Sarah favoured). This language differs from sign language in that "the permanence of the sentence not only makes it possible to study language without a memory problem, but to study memory in the context of language by regulating the duration for which the sentence remains on the board" (D. Premack 1979: 233). Sarah was taught nouns, verbs, adjectives, pronouns, and quantifiers; she was also taught same-difference,

negation, and compound sentences. The earliest words named various interesting fruits, so that Sarah could both solve her problem and eat it (A. Premack 1976: 79). Sarah exhibited displacement, the ability to think of something (in the following case, chocolate) when it is not immediately present. Presented with the sentence "Brown color of chocolate" without any chocolate present, and later presented with "Take brown," Sarah took a brown object (A. Premack 1976: 89). When a trainer put a question on Sarah's board and walked away, Sarah showed little interest in answering it--"in somewhat the way a conversation falters when one person ceases to pay attention to the other" (D. Premack 1971: 821). To show that Sarah was not merely responding to cues from her human trainers, she was adapted to a new trainer that did not know her language. When this trainer presented her with questions, she gave the correct answers less frequently than usual, but still well above chance. Ann Premack remarked that "it would be interesting to see how well a child at this language stage of about 150 words would do in a simple language test with a virtual stranger" (A. Premack 1976: 103). To test Sarah's view of words, Premack presented her with an apple and a set of features (for example, round vs. square and red vs. green). Then she was presented with her word for apple, and the same set of features. She choose the correct features for both the real apple and her word for apple, a light-blue plastic triangle (A. Premack 1976: 104). This demonstrates Hockett's property of arbitrariness; the symbol for apple is arbitrary (that is, there is no similarity between an apple and a light-blue plastic triangle). The following are examples of plactic tokens that used to teach Sarah:

c.

Nim Herbert S. Terrace was skeptical of the reported success of the chimpanzees Washoe,

Sarah, and Lana. He believed that there were simpler explanations for many of the reported interpretations of these apes' language use. Although Terrace admitted that the apes had achieved something significant, he compared their behaviour to that of pigeons who are taught to peck different colours in a certain order (Terrace 1979: 20). He also believed that the apes used signs only to receive rewards from their human trainers. When Terrace set up his own experiment with the chimpanzee Nim, "Nim's main reward for learning to sign was our approval and being able to sign about something that was important to him" (Terrace 1979: 145). Nim was raised like a human child and taught sign language in similar ways to those of Washoe. He was observed practicing his signs in the absence of their referents (Terrace 1979: 143). Nim often signed DIRTY (used when he had to go to the toilet) or SLEEP when he was bored and wanted a change. He used the signs BITE and ANGRY to express his feelings, and he tended not to attack if he perceived that his warning was heeded; this is an important substitution of an arbitrary word for a physical action, displaying Hockett's property of specialization (the speaker does not act out messages). Although Nim learned many words, Terrace concluded that Nim could not combine words to create new meanings on his own. He believed, from viewing videotapes, that the combinations of words that Nim used were prompted by prior utterances from his trainers. The other thing Terrace discovered from the videotapes was that Nim interrupted his trainers more than human children interrupt their parents. Terrace has a good point: if we are going to say that apes can create a sentence, we must eliminate the other possible explanations for the utterances (Terrace 1979: 219). Terrace is not as much of a skeptic as some others make him out to be, though; he believed that the conditions under which Project Nim were operated were not ideal, and future projects might have more success if they were able to instill a greater motivation to sign in their subjects (Terrace 1979: 223).

d.

Other Apes Language Experiments: Sherman & Austin, Chantek, Kanzi, Koko Many other ape language experiments were done other than the four described above; I

will briefly list several of these. Sherman and Austin were two chimpanzees who were able to communicate specific information to each other through the use of symbols, information that

they could not communicate without the symbols (Savage-Rumbaugh, Rumbaugh & Boysen: 1978). Chantek, an orangutan, learned about 150 different signs, and used them spontaneously and without undue repetition. Chantek internalized a minimal value system, using signs for GOOD and BAD in appropriate contexts (Miles 1993: 47, 52). A bonobo named Kanzi learned at a faster rate than the chimpanzees; he learned his first words by merely watching lessons directed at his mother. Sue Savage-Rumbaugh describes Kanzi as "the ape at the brink of the human mind" in her book of that title. Savage-Rumbaugh asserts that Kanzi uses sentences; that is, he follows structured rules in his multi-word utterances (showing the property of duality). He even makes up his own rules, such as first using a lexigram to specify an action and then using a gesture to specify an agent (Savage-Rumbaugh & Lewin: 1994: 161). Francine Patterson has been raising Koko, a gorilla, since 1972 and teaching her sign language. Koko has learned a greater vocabulary than Nim, uses more words per utterance on average, and "a great deal of creativity, spontaneity, and structure characterize her utterances" (Patterson & Linden 1981:116). Koko also rhymes and jokes; on one occasion she used a metaphor of an elephant to refer to herself when she pretended a long tube was her "trunk" (Patterson & Linden 1981: 143). These characteristics of Koko's utterances show the property of productivity, in which a speaker says something never heard or said before and is understood by the audience.

Teaching Artificial language to Chimpanzees Lana: The Computer Chimp The Rumbaughs (Rumbaugh, 1997; Savage-Rumbaugh & Rumbaugh, 1978) (another husband and wife team!) taught the chimp Lana a simple artificial language called Yerkish (after and Yerkishs Primate Center). Lana was named after the research programmed, which was called the LANguage Analogue project. Lana was just over 2 years old when the project began. The language consisted of seven colours and nine geometrical shapes which represented mainly object and actions. These items were displayed on a large keyboard and the keyboard was connected to a computer in another room. Lana had a press certain keys in the right sequence to make requests and consequently receive desire items, e.g. Please machine give milk or Please Tim give ball. Lana learned hundreds of sentences in this

fashion. She had names for people, food, objects, and even a special phrase that which is to name things she did not know the name of. Once she even asked the trainer to leave the room after he had purposely mixed up one of her sentences to test her reaction! Unfortunately, Lanas sentences were not created according to rule but were learned by rote, in a way similar to memorizing important whole sentences in a foreign language such as Where is the toilet? this learning does not provide one with the ability to create novel sentences. Most of the sentences Lana produced had to be learned over many trials. Additionally, as wallman (1992) notes, there is a problem with this and many of the ape language studies because there is no evidence to suggest that Lana had any notion of the meaning of please or even a childs rudimentary understanding of the sociolinguistic rules governing its usage. Researcher usually gives a gloss of meaning of each symbol however this may not equal the meaning that we have of please. Lana simply used the please key as part of making a request. Sue Savage-Rumbaugh herself believes that apes have but a limited ability for language acquisition. She has expressed the opinion that perhaps the media raised hopes too high for animal language research. (Although it might be said that animal researchers themselves have hardly been modest or cautionary in the initial claims they have made!) She says it is not likely that chimps might be able to talk about their dreams or tell us about how it feels to be a chimps. However, still the optimist, she goes on to say that while it is not yet possible that they might be able to communicate new ideas remains. Her hope lies in improving teaching techniques. However, the fact that human children learn language without being taught, simply though being exposed to meaningful speech in conjunction with objects, situations, and events in the environment, suggests to us that the search for better teaching techniques is not likely to yield much better result.

Sarah: The magnetic plastic token chimp An ingenious piece of research was one conceived by David Premack of the University of Pennsylvania involving a chimp by the name of Sarah. Rather than using sign language or electronic keyboards, Premack (1970, 1971, and 1976) gave Sarah 130 plastic token with magnets so that they could be manipulated easily by her and other. These included tokens for the names of colours such as red and blue, for different fruits such as banana

and peach and for action such as wash, cut and take, and some functions such as QUESTION. Atypical question which might be posed to Sarah was QUESTION banana red (is the banana red?), to which she would correctly answer no by means of a token. The tokens would adhere to a metallic board. Premacks research with Sarah makes it very clear that chimps are intelligent creatures. For example, Sarah had little trouble dealing with a feature once thought to be characteristic only of human language: displacement, i.e. the ability to talk about things that are not present. She was easily able to use her plastic tokens to request items that were not present, such as asking for fruit, e.g. Give Banana. When told brown colour of chocolate (Brown is the colour of chocolate), she was able to learn the new word brown, thereby demonstrating that she could learn new vocabulary item by instruction though language! (She had already acquired the meaning of the abstract word colour, which is, in itself, a notable achievement.) Other apes in Premacks research were also able to distinguish between strings of words differing only in word order, such as green on red and green on red. This clearly demonstrates that some syntax has been acquired, although this syntax is obviously of an elementary nature, since it involves only the order of nouns (in a locative relationship). Premack himself has taken the view that little more syntax than this can be learned by apes. Kanzi: A Pygmy Chimp Produces Synthesized Speech Before we finally give up the ghost, we should take into account the distinction between production and comprehension. So far our emphasis has been on the language that chimpanzees can produce themselves. But we might also consider what they can understand. Perhaps the neuromotor co-ordination required to produce signs or press lexigram symbols obscures the chimpanzees true level of linguistic competence. It is certainly well known that young children experience a lag between comprehension and production. Two-year-olds generally understand far more words than they can actually utter themselves (Griffiths, 1986). It is conceivable, then, that chimpanzees are in the same boat. Accordingly, SavageRumbaugh et al. (1993) tested Kanzis ability to follow complex instructions, issued in spoken English.Recall that Kanzislanguage learning was always, in a sense, bilingual, involving exposure to both lexigrams and spoken English.Typical instructions are shown below:

Instructions followed by Kanzi Go to the microwave and get the shoe Give the monster mask to Kelly Turn the flashlight on Give the big tomato to Liz Take the ice back to the refrigerator Savage-Rumbaughet al.(1993)report an overall success rate of 71per centin Kanzis ability to carry out instructions of this kind. But the criteria for judging success are extremely liberal. More to the point, there is no evidence that Kanzi can understand every word addressed to him. And the basis on which he acts can very often be as cribbed to pragmatic factors, rather than his interpretation of grammatical rules to get at meaning. For example, if you hand me a flashlight I will probably turn it on, because thats what one does with flashlights. If I hear Give the big tomato to Liz, I would only need to know the words tomato and Liz to guess that these two objects should be married up. A sit happens; Kanzi took two tomatoes of different sizes, and gave them both to Liz. This response was scored as Partially Correct, even though the intention ofthe sentence wasto distinguish between large and small exemplars of a category (tomato). Using a stricter definition of correct, where Kanzi performs the requested action immediately, and where we include only blind trials in which the instructor is out of sight, Kanzis success rate dropsto 59 per cent. And, as noted, this success may be achieved, in large measure, without knowledge of grammar. Instructions can often be carried out correctly from an understanding of one or two individual word meanings. Overall, then, the work on Kanzis comprehension does not lend any extra confidence to the idea that apes can acquire grammar.

Teaching language to Dolphins Elvar: The whistling dolphins There is much anecdotal lore about the intelligence of dolphins and whales. Until the 1960s, though, no scientific attempt had been made to determine their communicative abilities. In one of the first studies, Lilly, (1962, 1965) tried to teach a dolphin to force air though its blow-hole in such a way that it would allow the dolphins to imitate human speech

sounds. A young male dolphin named Elvar produce approximations of the word squirt, which Lilly had been trying to teach him to pronounce. Lilly also claimed that Elvar interchanged human sound with dolphin sounds as if he were attempting to translate, but Lilly provided no scientific substantiation in this regard. In fact, pronunciation difficulties were so great that Lilly was obliged to discontinue the study. He then moved on to investigate the means by which dolphins communicate with one another. Notwithstanding Lillys extravagant claims to the contrary (including claims that dolphins have an intelligence and a religion (!) that is superior to those of human, research has yet to show that these animals use anything as complex as what could call language.

Akeakamai and phoenix: Learning Artificial language though sight and sound A radically different and more scientific approach to the teaching of language to dolphins was later initiated by Louis Herman at the Dolphins mimic human sounds, Herman and his associates (Herman &Wolz, 1984) trained a bottle nosed dolphin to mimic computer generated sounds. The dolphin not only demonstrated that it could learn new whistles but also that it could apply these whistles to the naming of objects such as ball, hoop, and frisbee. This is similar to the apes abilities to name objects; Herman then turned his attention to the primary process of language comprehension. In his investigation of the dolphins language comprehension, Herman and his associates (Herman, Richards, &Wold, 1987) conducted experiments using two different types of artificial language, one involving sounds, the other involving visual gestures, i.e. sign. He wanted to see if, or how well, dolphins could learn to comprehend language. This was done not only to see if the animals could learn a human created language system, but also to discover more about the cognitive abilities of dolphins. In 1979, a teaching programme was begun with two dolphins, Phoenix and Akeakamai (the letters name meaning lover of wisdom in the Hawaiian language). Each dolphin learned one of the two artificial language. Akea was taught the gesture based language, while Phoenix was taught the sound-based language. Each was taught a vocabulary of about 30 words, mainly names of object, agents, actions, and modifiers. The sound based language had its sounds projected underwater into the dolphin tank. These sounds were controlled by Herman and his assistants from their underwater laboratory, which had a window view into the tank. The visual language of gestures, invented by Herman and his colleagues, involved the use of the trainers arms and hands. The trainer stood by the side of the tank out of the water where he or she could be seen by the dolphins. The trainer would place and move his or her aims in different position as in a sort of semaphore signal system. To avoid the unconscious giving of helpful cues to the dolphins could not see their eyes. The two dolphins learned to carry out correctly a number of commands in the water. The command consisted of two, three, four, and even five word sequences, with each

command constructed on the basic of object and action words. Thus, window tails touch is to be interpreted as Touch a window with your tail. The basic sentence structured was of the Subject-Object-Verb variety. Of special interest are Hermans results which show that generally the dolphins correctly responded to what are often called semantically reversible sentences, i.e. sentences for which the subjects and object cannot be interpreted by meaning alone but where the use of syntactic knowledge is required.

Teaching Spoken English to an African Grey Parrot

We all know that Parrot and some other birds can immitate human language, but can they learn language? According to Irene Pepperbergs research, most of us thought not. Her fascinating research has proven us wrong. She has worked with a male African Grey Parrot, which she call Alex. She use the speech mode because of the parrot excellent vocal and hearing abilities. Alex is now able to understand and answer question on the color, shape, and material of more than 100 objects. Alex is not only can identifying items but he can also request, refuse them, and answer questions pertaining to the abstract categories of shape, colour, material, and quantity. Thus, in a test of Alex cognitive abilities involving a variety of questions, Alex can performed it well more than 80% of the questions. Alex few errors are even more interesting than his correct performance. Alexs accomplishments are admirable and in some ways, especially with his recognition of abstract categories, he has surpassed aspects of languageknowledge that the apes and even the dolphins have demonstrated. He has not yet, though, reach the level of yntax that the dolphins have mastered. However, given that this research with Alex is ongoing and given that parrots are noted for their longevity, there is still achance that Alex might acquire more syntax.

Animal Communication in the Wild

Animal communication through a wide variety of means. Not like human speech which is only one small part of the communication of chirps, hisses, growls, snorts, whristles, gestures, barks, and buzzes which we can find in the rest of animal kingdom (Steinberg: 2001). Many animal use sign and many other use other sense of modalities. Ubstances involving smell may be used as signals, as in

the case of ants, which leave chemical trails for nestmates to follow in finding food, and many other examples. Vervet Monkeys Wild vervet monkeys, as Seyfart and Cheney report, make specific sounds that are more complicated than hitherto believed. For example, these monkeys alarm calls seem t o be predator specific. Thus, while one type of grunt indicates (1a) Beware, here comes an eagle!, another type of grunt indicates (2a) Beware, here come leopard!, while still another means (3a) Beware, here comes the snake!However these grunts could just as well be interpreted as meaning (1b) Danger from above! the eagle situation in (1a), (2b) Danger from the bushes!, the leopard situation in (2a), or (3b) Danger on the ground!, the snake situation is in (3a). The grunts may not refer to the o bjects of the eagle, leopard, and snake but to the location s of the objects above. in the bushes, and on the ground. Turn-taking in Sound Making Animals have been found to use some human longuistic phenomena in natural cmmunication (Snowden, 1993; cited in Steinberg, 2001). For example monkeys take turns in their communication (one monkey waits to the other to finish before making sounds). Communication of birds is often similarly governed.

CHAPTER IV CONCLUSION

Understand communication and able to communicate are two different things. Tained animals, like in circus are understand the language because they give respond to human speaking. Fo example: sit down and etc. It also happen with Viki, Gua and other experiments discussed above. But it doesnt mean that those animals are able to communicate or understand the language but it only result from responses that conditioned or conditional responses. According to generative transformation theory from Chomsky communication ability is an ability to produce new words which never heard or said from other people. Therefore, it clear that animals cannot communicate. It also proved from no animal communication system fulfils all of the criteria which outlined by Hockett (1968). When we look at animal communication, however, it is clear that whether it is prompted by hunger, anger, danger, attraction, submission, or the need to congregate or disperse, one signal has a fixed meaning combination of signs to form more complex structures rarely occur. Natural animal communication seems to be quite specific and stereotyped. Animal calls or signs or scents have a fixed meaning, and, whatever means an animal migh use for communicating, it has never been demonstrated that it involves creative recombination or the use of complex structures that are typical of human language.

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