When humans talk, elephants listen – and listen losely. New research shows African elephants can tell people of different ethnic groups apart after hearing them speak just a few sentences.
The research also found that elephants listening to human utterances can distinguish between men and women and between adult and child. More than just a parlor trick, this keen insight into human language may help elephants decide whether a nearby human is a fearsome predator threat or a minor nuisance.
“They're using vocal information from another species – us – and they're using that to discern threat,” said study co-author Graeme Shannon, a behavioral ecologist at Britain's University of Sussex. “That takes really advanced cognitive abilities. … These are subtle differences these elephants are attending to.”
Those huge ears aren't for nothing. Elephants can distinguish between the roar of a single lion and the roaring of a trio of lions, and the oldest, most seasoned elephants can tell the roar of a male lion from the roar of a female, according to a 2011 paper by Shannon and his co-author Karen McComb, also of the University of Sussex. Elephants also distinguish between the signature calls of many other elephant groups, including groups they haven't seen for years, McComb has found.
To test elephants' ability to parse human speech, the researchers turned to the 1,500 or so elephants roaming Kenya's Amboseli National Park.
The scientists placed loudspeakers – disguised with a screen of palm leaves – near herds of elephants, then serenaded the animals with recordings of a person saying, “Look, look over there, a group of elephants is coming.” When the voice belonged to a Maasai man, the elephants tended to sniff the air and bunch closely together for protection. But when the voice was a Kamba man's, the elephants were more nonchalant. The elephants also reacted with relative calm to the voices of Maasai women and boys, who, unlike Maasai men, generally don't take part in spearing elephants.
The animals' responses show they're extracting clues about ethnic group, gender and age from human voices to gauge when to react immediately and when to stay put a bit longer, the researchers said.
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