The comparative study of grammar learning mechanisms: birds as models

Human language learning is based on the ability to acquire and apply grammar rules. Comparative studies using nonhuman animals may help to understand the nature, human uniqueness and evolution of language-related rule learning mechanisms. This brief review outlines what studies on birds can contribute to this understanding. It shows that birds are capable of categorization and concept learning and can detect structural regularities in strings of items. It next turns to studies inspired by artificial grammar learning studies in human infants and discusses whether and to what extent birds can learn rules that define structural relationships between arbitrary items. This ability seems present, but this issue calls for further investigation.