Fig. 3: Within-syllable pitch trajectories show time-localized learning.

a, b median (solid line) and quantiles (shaded area) of within-syllable pitch during baseline (blue) and on the last day of substitution (last day subs, red) in a subs-high (a) and a subs-low bird (b). The two dashed vertical lines show the window within which we calculated pitch to determine whether to switch off the light or not. The bird numbers correspond to target syllable numbers in Fig. 1g. c, d Average spectrogram of the targeted syllable before (top row) and after (bottom row) the substitution paradigm. Same time axis as in (a). The horizontal black bar indicates the pitch calculation window. e, f Traces of normalized pitch differences between (the last day of) baseline and the last day of subs in deaf subs (e) and in hearing LO birds (f). Birds adapted pitch within about 10 ms of the pitch calculation time window (delimited by dashed vertical lines). The fine curves show pitch difference traces in individual birds, the thick curve their average, and the gray area indicates the average ± one standard deviation. Curves in birds that decreased pitch are flipped to make pitch changes positive.