Laboratory for Biolinguistics, Riken Brain Science Institute, 2-1 Hirosawa, Wako, Saitama, 351-0198, Japan.
J Comp Physiol A Neuroethol Sens Neural Behav Physiol. 2012 Feb;198(2):109-17. doi: 10.1007/s00359-011-0692-z. Epub 2011 Nov 13.
Generation of the motor patterns of emotional sounds in mammals occurs in the periaqueductal gray matter of the midbrain and is not directly controlled by the cortex. The medial frontal cortex indirectly controls vocalizations, based on the recognition of social context. We examined whether the medial frontal cortex was responsible for antiphonal vocalization, or turn-taking, in naked mole-rats. In normal turn-taking, naked mole-rats vocalize more frequently to dominant individuals than to subordinate ones. Bilateral lesions of the medial frontal cortex disrupted differentiation of call rates to the stimulus animals, which had varied social relationships to the subject. However, medial frontal cortex lesions did not affect either the acoustic properties of the vocalizations or the timing of the vocal exchanges. This suggests that the medial frontal cortex may be involved in social cognition or decision making during turn-taking, while other regions of the brain regulate when animals vocalize and the vocalizations themselves.
哺乳动物情绪声音的运动模式产生于中脑的导水管周围灰质，而不是直接由大脑皮层控制。大脑前额叶皮层通过识别社会背景，间接地控制发声。我们研究了大脑前额叶皮层是否负责裸鼹鼠的对唱或轮流发声。在正常的轮流发声中，裸鼹鼠对优势个体的发声频率高于对从属个体的发声频率。大脑前额叶皮层的双侧损伤破坏了对刺激动物的叫声频率的分化，而刺激动物与被试动物有着不同的社会关系。然而，大脑前额叶皮层损伤既不影响发声的声学特性，也不影响发声交换的时间。这表明，大脑前额叶皮层可能参与了轮流发声过程中的社会认知或决策，而大脑的其他区域则调节动物发声的时间和发声本身。
