Aloha Colleagues: On behalf of my co-authors, I pleased to announce the publication of the following paper on humpback whale song. "Green, S. R., Mercado, E. III, Pack, A. A, & Herman, L. M. (2011). Recurring patterns in the songs of humpback whales (Megaptera novaeangliae), Behavioural Processes, 86, 284-294. The abstract is presented below: Humpback whales, unlike most mammalian species, learn new songs as adults. Populations of singers progressively and collectively change the sounds and patterns within their songs throughout their lives and across generations. In this study, humpback whale songs recorded in Hawaii from 1985 to 1995 were analyzed using self-organizing maps (SOMs) to classify the sounds within songs, and to identify sound patterns that were present across multiple years. These analyses supported the hypothesis that recurring, persistent patterns exist within whale songs, and that these patterns are defined at least in part by acoustic relationships between adjacent sounds within songs. Sound classification based on acoustic differences between adjacent sounds yielded patterns within songs that were more consistent from year to year than classifications based on the properties of single sounds. Maintenance of fixed ratios of acoustic modulation across sounds, despite large variations in individual sounds, suggests intrinsic constraints on how sounds change within songs. Such acoustically invariant cues may enable whales to recognize and assess variations in songs despite propagation-related distortion of individual sounds and yearly changes in songs. Pdfs copies can be obtained from the lead author Sean Green at srgreenub@yahoo.com Best regards, Adam Pack ------------------------------------------------------------ Adam A. Pack, Ph.D. Associate Professor Psychology & Biology University of Hawaii at Hilo Mailing Address: Psychology Department University of Hawaii at Hilo 200 West Kawili St. Hilo, Hawaii 96720 Voice: 808-375-7892 email: pack@hawaii.edu