Alexandra Alleya Nicolle S.

Boa
BSED-ENGLISH 1A
Article reviewed:

Pika, S., Wilkinson, R., Kendrick, K.H., & Vernes, S.C.(2018). Taking turns: Bridging the
gap between human and animals communication. Proceedings of the Royal
Society B: Biological Sciences,285(1880). https//doi.org/10.1098/rspb.2018.0598

The article, “Taking Turns: Bridging the gap between human and animal communication”,
by Pika S, Wilkinson R, Kendrick KH, Vernes SC. N investigated the current scientific literature
on the way how animals communicate. Thus, they found out that the orderly exchanging
communicative signals of the animal kingdom are somewhat far from the common that we
thought about. The researchers emphasized the art of turn-taking in the non-human
communication; it focuses in the birds, mammals and anural taxa. It is stated in the article that
turn-taking has been suggested as an ancient mechanism of the language system that bridge
the existing gap between the humans’ articulation and its primates. They even discussed their
new comparative framework wherein its purpose is to facilitate the large scale and systematic
cross species comparisons which also allows and helps to trace the evolutionary history of the
remarkable turn taking behavior. Furthermore it can also address the longstanding mystery
about the origin of the human language and the evolutionary theory. The article provides
relevant information about the similarities and differences as well as the important key points
where there is lacking and matching characteristics element of human turn taking.
We all know that language is the most complex form that is unique to humans although
animals have found to have basic communication patterns, this led the researchers to the gap
that they are trying to fulfill which is the mystery in the evolution of language in both humans and
primates. Language is something that is composed of layers of abilities,different types and
different past. The researchers tried to unpeel these layers to help us understand which
distinctive mechanism in language that has evolved from the communicative systems of the
non-human primates. Upon reading the article makes me realize stuffs that is really possible
with the complexity of the existence of language. It stated in the introductory the main key points
of the purpose of the article, it explains that there are already further researches that take
interest on how animals communicate. The most promising part of the paper is the idea to tackle
the question whether turn-taking plays an important key role in the evolution of language. Also if
turn-taking has contributed small change that made a big difference in the human history.
 However, languages differ at every level of the construction from the sounds, to syntax, to
meaning, to flexibility and to expressivity. And it is stated by the innateness theory by Chomsky
that the possession of language distinguishes man from animals. But there are some
researches that take place on proving that there is this kind of language that animals use to
communicate. This gap is the focus of the team of Pika to bridge. This mechanism of turn
taking, it consists of reciprocal exchanges of alternating short and flexible turns between two or
more interactants and this is used universally across the languages that show signs of
evolutionary parallel in all the clades of the primate lineages. The coordinated communicative
exchanges that is present also to animals like, let's say for an instance is the timing which is a
very important feature of communicative turn taking in both human and non-human animals is
also present. And also the overlapping can be also found in the way of communication of the
non-animals that also leads to misunderstandings as same the humans.
By the end of the article it is concluded that the comparisons that takes place in the
researches of turn taking skills of non-human animals in the relation of the origin of language
are highly constrained by the lack of data, applications, methodological designs and the
environment itself. The parameters tested across the different taxa and species of the turn
taking of the non-human animals have mainly concerned a single key element of full blown
human turn taking which is the time window. And mostly the progress that concerns the in depth
understanding of the degree of similarity between human and non-human communicative turn
taking systems has been made by studies taking into consideration. Rossano and Frohlinch et
al investigated gestural interactions of great apes with a special focus on turn allocation
techniques, distinct time windows and adjacency pair like structures.
The challenge that they face is the getting all together the information of all the various
studies published. The focus could be on the chirps of the birds or the whistle of the dolphins
and etc. But after reading the article I am amazed and impressed to know how complex animal
communication really is and how is it parallel to the human communication. But there is some
point that the article is somewhat boring because of the unfamiliar key points and I suggest that
they should put definition of terms to increase the interest of readers. It can be seen that their
points are clear which to determine the similarities and difference to bridge the gap in the
communication of the non-human and humans. According to Promkin, Rodman and Hyams in
our past discussion, when we know a language we can understood and speak to others who
know the same language which means we have the capacity to produce sounds that signify
certain meanings and to understand and interpret the sounds produced by the others. In this
statement we can conclude that animal language can be considered have the turn taking
behavior that is parallel also to humans. Communication was thought to be an exclusively
human trait but with this study, it shows and flawed the idea reporting that many animals, the
non-human primate from elephants to mosquitoes employ turn taking behavior when
communicating among them. This finding might one day be the key to help scientists pinpoint
the real origin of the human speech and answer the big mystery of the phylogenetic.

Reference:
Pika, S., Wilkinson, R., Kendrick, K.H., & Vernes, S.C.(2018). Taking turns: Bridging the
gap between human and animals communication. Proceedings of the Royal
Society B: Biological Sciences,285(1880). https//doi.org/10.1098/rspb.2018.0598