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Vocal Communication in Family-Living and Pair-Bonded Primates

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Primate Hearing and Communication

Part of the book series: Springer Handbook of Auditory Research ((SHAR,volume 63))

Abstract

Family-living and pair-bonded primates, such as gibbons, night monkeys, titi monkeys, marmosets, and tamarins, have some different social and ecological challenges than other primates and thus display some differences in vocal communication. Shared parental care, territory defense, pair-bond maintenance, and frequent exchange of roles throughout the day are common in family-living and pair-bonded primates. These species are usually sexually monomorphic, and they show relatively few sex differences in vocal output. Vocal communication is important in forming and maintaining pair bonds and in defending the pairs or family territory. In addition, these species appear to use vocal communication to a greater degree during social learning and putative teaching behavior, and adults appear to guide vocal development in young through reinforcement of vocal behavior. Adults of these species show great flexibility and plasticity in both vocal structure and usage in response to both social and environmental variation. They also adjust vocal output according to habitat acoustics to maximize audibility and minimize risk of predation. This chapter examines each of these areas of vocal communication to illustrate how family-living and pair-bonding primates use vocal communication.

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Acknowledgments

I thank the many students and colleagues who have served as collaborators on my own research, especially Yvonne Pola, Jayne Cleveland, A. Margaret Elowson, Rebecca Roush, Cristina Lazaro-Perea, Stella de la Torre, Stella Joyce, and Tatyana Humle. Much of my research reported here was supported by USPHS Grant MH029775. I thank the editors for their critical feedback on an earlier version of this chapter.

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Charles T. Snowdon states that he has no conflicts of interest.

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  1. Department of Psychology, University of Wisconsin, 1202 West Johnson Street, Madison, WI, 53706, USA

    Charles T. Snowdon

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  1. Charles T. Snowdon
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Correspondence to Charles T. Snowdon .

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Editors and Affiliations

  1. Department of Anthropology, Binghamton University, Binghamton, New York, USA

    Rolf M. Quam

  2. Department of Anthropology, Humboldt State University, Arcata, California, USA

    Marissa A. Ramsier

  3. Loyola University Chicago, Chicago, Illinois, USA

    Richard R. Fay

  4. Department of Biology, University of Maryland, College Park, Maryland, USA

    Arthur N. Popper

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Snowdon, C.T. (2017). Vocal Communication in Family-Living and Pair-Bonded Primates. In: Quam, R., Ramsier, M., Fay, R., Popper, A. (eds) Primate Hearing and Communication. Springer Handbook of Auditory Research, vol 63. Springer, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-59478-1_6

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