Data from: Both learning and syntax recognition are used by great tits when answering to mobbing calls

Mobbing behavior, in addition to its complex cooperative aspects, is
particularly suitable to study the mechanisms implicated in heterospecific
communication. Indeed, various mechanisms ranging from pure learning to
innate recognition have been proposed. One promising, yet understudied
mechanism could be syntax recognition, especially given the latest works
published on syntax comprehension in birds. In this experiment, we test
whether great tits use both learning and syntax recognition when
responding to heterospecifics. In the first part of the experiment, we
demonstrate that great tits show different responses to the same
heterospecific calls depending on their sympatric status. In a second
part, we explore the impact of reorganizing the notes of the
heterospecific mobbing calls to fit the syntax of great tits. Great tits
showed an increased mobbing response toward the heterospecific calls when
they shared their own call organization. Our results corroborate the
recent finding that syntactic rules in bird calls may have a strong impact
on their communication systems and enlighten how various mechanisms can be
used by the same species to respond to heterospecific calls.