Information theory has been discussed as a technique to analyse communicative processes
or sequential behaviour of nonhuman animals, as in MacKay (1972), Slater (1973) and
Bradbury & Vehrencamp (1998, chapters 13–15) among others. Recently, McCowan et …

AZipf plot (or statistic) is a log–log plot of the frequency of occurrence of signalling units
(letters, words, phonemes, etc.) against their rank order (1st, 2nd, 3rd). Zipf's law emerges for
almost all languages' letters and words as an approximate slope of ÿ1 in this log–log plot, a …

… In non-human animals, an inverse relationship between signal length and frequency of use may
also be expected, if longer signals are costly to produce and the more frequent use of … One of the
first documented tests of Zipf's Law of abbreviation in a non-human animal was in …

… of the communicative complexity characteristic of an “intelligent message” content within these
animals' signals, perhaps … Nevertheless Zipf plots can be potentially useful indicators of
higher-order complexity and … 3. Information theory applied to animal communication systems …

Page 1. The 'chick-a-dee' calls of Parus atricapillus: A recombinant system of animal
communication compared with written English … We describe here what we believe to be one
of the most interesting systems of animal communication yet discovered …

… In this sense, a Zipf plot of parts-of-signals, whole signals, and sequential … the highest degree
of Shannon entropy, emerging in studies of non-human animal communication systems compared …
Many animals (and plants, for that matter) will likely show a first-order entropic value …

Abstract Information complexity in animals is an indicator of advanced communication and
an intricate socio‐ecology. Zipf's Law of least effort has been used to assess the potential
information content of animal repertoires, including whether or not a particular animal  …

… theory to the analysis of animal communication systems, we applied a series of information theory
statistics to a statistically categorized set of bottlenose dolphin, Tursiops truncatus, whistle
vocalizations. First, we use the first-order entropic relation in a Zipf-type diagram (Zipf …

… theory; biological communications; chemical plant signals information theory; biological
communications; chemical plant … A Zipf's Law examination of the frequency-of-occurrence
components has also previously been applied to various animal communication systems as …

… of human languages is often demonstrated by their almost universal fit to Zipf's “Law of … Despite
being a fundamental principle in human language, its applicability to animals is controversial …
The potential lack of fit of animal vocal communication systems to Law of Brevity might be …