(AFP/Web Desk) — Elephants use individual names to call each other, reveals a new study released on Monday.

While dolphins and parrots have been observed mimicking sounds to address each other, researchers have found that elephants are the first non-human animals to use names that do not involve imitation.

An international team of researchers employed artificial intelligence to analyze the calls of two wild herds of African savannah elephants in Kenya for this groundbreaking study.

The research “not only shows that elephants use specific vocalizations for each individual, but that they recognize and react to a call addressed to them while ignoring those addressed to others,” said lead study author Michael Pardo, as reported by AFP.

“This indicates that elephants can determine whether a call was intended for them just by hearing the call, even when out of its original context,” added Pardo, a behavioral ecologist at Colorado State University, in a statement.

The researchers analyzed recordings from Kenya’s Samburu National Reserve and Amboseli National Park, collected between 1986 and 2022, to sift through elephant “rumbles.”

Using a machine learning algorithm, they identified 469 distinct calls, including 101 calls made and 117 calls received by elephants.

Elephants produce a wide range of sounds, from loud trumpeting to low-frequency rumbles inaudible to the human ear.

Names were not always used in the elephant calls, but they were often called out over long distances and when adults were addressing young elephants.