[from Mary Powers 990617]
Rick -
I don't know if you are asking for data on the animal control list or
CSGnet - but the 3-June-99 Nature has a paper (p.466) by A. Leonardo and M.
Konishi: Decrystallization of adult birdsong by perturbation of auditory
feedback.
"Crystallization" refers to the notion that once a young bird has learned
its species' song, the song is stable for unknown reasons (called
crystallization which implies that the song has somehow solidified in the
brain). These two guys tried interfering with auditory feedback, and
whaddaya know, the song deteriorated (oops, I mean decrystallized).
Restoration of feedback -> recovery of song. I quote: "Here we present
evidence that auditory feedback is actively used in adulthood to maintain
the stability of song structure".
Mary P.