A California sea lion (Zalophus californianus) can keep the beat: motor entrainment to rhythmic auditory stimuli in a non vocal mimic.
Level 5 - mechanism / opinion, no new human data
Animal behavioral study in a single subject
PubMed 23544769 · doi:10.1037/a0032345
What was done
Researchers tested whether a non-vocal mimic, a California sea lion (Zalophus californianus), could learn to entrain motor actions (head bobbing) to rhythmic auditory stimuli. The study evaluated three criteria: executing a movement distinct from the sound stimulus, transferring the rhythmic entrainment to novel tempos, and entraining movement to complex musical tracks.
What was found
The abstract reports that the sea lion successfully learned motor entrainment across novel tempos and complex musical stimuli without reproducing the acoustic stimulus. Specific quantitative metrics, error bounds, and statistical values were not reported in the abstract.
Why it matters
This study provides evidence against the vocal learning and synchronization hypothesis, demonstrating that rhythmic motor entrainment does not strictly require neural adaptations dedicated to vocal mimicry.
Limits
The study was conducted in a single animal (n = 1), limiting generalizability across the species or to other non-vocal mimic taxa. Quantitative performance accuracy, phase-locking consistency, and training details were not provided in the abstract.