From random to regular: neural constraints on the emergence of isochronous rhythm during cultural transmission.

ABSTRACT: A core design feature of human communication systems and expressive behaviours is their temporal organization. The cultural evolutionary origins of this feature remain unclear. Here, we test the hypothesis that regularities in the temporal organization of signalling sequences arise in the course of cultural transmission as adaptations to aspects of cortical function. We conducted two experiments on the transmission of rhythms associated with affective meanings, focusing on one of the most widespread forms of regularity in language and music: isochronicity. In the first experiment, we investigated how isochronous rhythmic regularities emerge and change in multigenerational signalling games, where the receiver (learner) in a game becomes the sender (transmitter) in the next game. We show tha

SUBMITTER: Lumaca M 

PROVIDER: S-EPMC6123518 | biostudies-literature | 2018 Sep

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature