Lesions of the anterior forebrain song control pathway in female canaries affect song perception in an operant task

We tested whether the avian anterior forebrain pathway functions in song perception in female canaries, and whether it is specialized for conspecific song perception or functions more generally in auditory perception. Using operant conditioning methods, we trained female canaries to discriminate among synthetic sound stimuli, canary songs, and song sparrow songs. We also trained each bird to discriminate among visual stimuli to test for general effects of lesions on performance. When canaries had learned the discrimination tasks, bilateral electrolytic lesions of the lateral portion of the magnocellular nucleus of the anterior neostriatum (lMAN) were made. The lesioned birds were then tested on the previously learned discrimination tasks. Lesions that destroyed most or all of lMAN decreased the ability of female canaries to discriminate between previously learned pairs of acoustic stimuli of all types, while visual discrimination was unaffected. These results suggest that the female canary anterior forebrain pathway contributes to the perception of acoustic stimuli, with this contribution including heterospecific song and other acoustic stimuli as well as canary song.