Scientists have discovered that grey seals can mimic human speech and songs using the same sound production mechanisms as people. Researchers at the University of St Andrews in Scotland monitored three grey seals since birth and played them sounds to honk back — with encouraging results that they say could help humans in the future.
"Copies were not perfect but given that these are not typical seal sounds it is pretty impressive," Stansbury said in the university's news release. "Our study really demonstrates how flexible seal vocalisations are. Previous studies just provided anecdotal evidence for this."
Janik said the study has implications for humans as well as seals, and could help shed light on speech disorders.
"This study gives us a better understanding of the evolution of vocal learning, a skill that is crucial for human language development," he said. "Finding other mammals that use their vocal tract in the same way as us to modify sounds informs us on how vocal skills are influenced by genetics and learning and can ultimately help to develop new methods to study speech disorders."