Objective
Speech is a human diagnosing feature but its evolution is problematic. While great apes – our closest relatives – seem incapable of learning to produce new calls, speech is essentially learned anew each generation. Based on the largest call database ever assembled from of any great ape (namely, orangutans) and pioneering empirical tests to be conducted in the wild and captivity, this project envisions addressing the puzzle of speech evolution conclusively. Namely, this project will assess the hypothesis that human consonants and vowels stem from articulatory and acoustic homologues present in great apes – voiceless and voiced calls, respectively. Objective 1 will investigate whether great ape voiceless and voiced calls exhibit different evolutionary trajectories and rates as observed between consonant and vowels in humans. Objective 2 will analyze, via playback experiments in great ape territory, how the evolutionary ecology of human paleoforms affected the use of consonant-like voiceless calls and vowel-like voiced calls, potentially explaining why these two basis linguistic elements started to be combined for the first time in our lineage. Objective 3 is set up to uncover, via human-ape match tests in captivity, the precise range of articulatory control that great apes exert over vocal production, ultimately indicating the sounds that constituted the first words to be uttered by early human ancestors. Altogether, this project brings a new basal pillar into the theoretic edifice of speech evolution and brings the topic back to the forefront of European and worldwide scientific inquiry. The project has gathered the best hosting conditions conceivable within the field of primate cognition research and is to be conducted in the prestigious School of Psychology and Neuroscience of University of St. Andrews, UK, and to be co-supervised by the prominent and prolific authors Prof. Josep Call and Prof. Klaus Zuberbühler.
Fields of science (EuroSciVoc)
CORDIS classifies projects with EuroSciVoc, a multilingual taxonomy of fields of science, through a semi-automatic process based on NLP techniques. See: https://op.europa.eu/en/web/eu-vocabularies/euroscivoc.
CORDIS classifies projects with EuroSciVoc, a multilingual taxonomy of fields of science, through a semi-automatic process based on NLP techniques. See: https://op.europa.eu/en/web/eu-vocabularies/euroscivoc.
- natural sciences biological sciences zoology mammalogy primatology
- natural sciences biological sciences neurobiology
- natural sciences computer and information sciences data science
- natural sciences computer and information sciences databases
- natural sciences biological sciences ecology evolutionary ecology
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Programme(s)
Multi-annual funding programmes that define the EU’s priorities for research and innovation.
Multi-annual funding programmes that define the EU’s priorities for research and innovation.
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H2020-EU.1.3. - EXCELLENT SCIENCE - Marie Skłodowska-Curie Actions
MAIN PROGRAMME
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H2020-EU.1.3.2. - Nurturing excellence by means of cross-border and cross-sector mobility
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Topic(s)
Calls for proposals are divided into topics. A topic defines a specific subject or area for which applicants can submit proposals. The description of a topic comprises its specific scope and the expected impact of the funded project.
Calls for proposals are divided into topics. A topic defines a specific subject or area for which applicants can submit proposals. The description of a topic comprises its specific scope and the expected impact of the funded project.
Funding Scheme
Funding scheme (or “Type of Action”) inside a programme with common features. It specifies: the scope of what is funded; the reimbursement rate; specific evaluation criteria to qualify for funding; and the use of simplified forms of costs like lump sums.
Funding scheme (or “Type of Action”) inside a programme with common features. It specifies: the scope of what is funded; the reimbursement rate; specific evaluation criteria to qualify for funding; and the use of simplified forms of costs like lump sums.
MSCA-IF-EF-ST - Standard EF
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Call for proposal
Procedure for inviting applicants to submit project proposals, with the aim of receiving EU funding.
Procedure for inviting applicants to submit project proposals, with the aim of receiving EU funding.
(opens in new window) H2020-MSCA-IF-2015
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Net EU financial contribution. The sum of money that the participant receives, deducted by the EU contribution to its linked third party. It considers the distribution of the EU financial contribution between direct beneficiaries of the project and other types of participants, like third-party participants.
KY16 9AJ ST ANDREWS
United Kingdom
The total costs incurred by this organisation to participate in the project, including direct and indirect costs. This amount is a subset of the overall project budget.