The most common word is used twice as often as the second most common word, three times as often as the third most common ...

Language has long been considered a uniquely human trait, with features that mark it out as distinct from the communication ...

The animals’ complex songs share structural patterns with human language that may make them easier for whales to learn, a new ...

The sounds that make up humpback whale songs follow some of the same statistical rules seen in human languages, which may be ...

Zipf’s law of abbreviation was only found to apply to blue whales and humpback whales, though only five species could be ...

Whale song, though technically not a language, is organized in a familiar pattern.

"Using insights and methods from how babies learn language allowed us to discover previously undetected structure in whale ...

Two new studies have found that whale song has structural similarities to human languages, especially when it comes to efficiency and brevity. It’s leading researchers to believe that evolutionary ...

A key discovery was that whale song follows Zipf’s Law—a principle in human language where the most frequently used words ...

Humpback whale songs share structural similarities with human language, suggesting complex communication patterns.

Researchers identified statistically coherent patterns in whale song that may be a signature of cultural learning.