The Dancing Mouse, by Robert M. Yerkes pptx

VOLUME I THE DANCING MOUSE A Study in Animal Behavior... activity of which the mice are capable; theways in which they learn to reactadaptively to new or novel situations; thefacility wi

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Author: Robert M Yerkes

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[Illustration: DANCING MICE—

SNIFFING AND EATING.]

THE ANIMAL BEHAVIOR SERIES VOLUME I

THE DANCING MOUSE

A Study in Animal Behavior

ROBERT M YERKES, Ph.D

INSTRUCTOR IN COMPARATIVEPSYCHOLOGY IN HARVARD

UNIVERSITY

The Cartwright Prize of the Alumni

Association of the College of

Physicians and Surgeons, ColumbiaUniversity, was awarded, in 1907, for anEssay which comprised the first twelvechapters of this volume

1907

IN LOVE AND GRATITUDE THIS BOOK IS

the time of its occurrence, seemed to be anunimportant incident in the course of myscientific work— the presentation of apair of dancing mice to the Harvard

Psychological Laboratory My interest inthe peculiarities of behavior which thecreatures exhibited, as I watched themcasually from day to day, soon becameexperiment-impelling, and almost before Irealized it, I was in the midst of an

investigation of their senses and

intelligence

The longer I observed and experimentedwith them, the more numerous became theproblems which the dancers presented to

me for solution From a study of the senses

of hearing and sight I was led to

investigate, in turn, the various forms of

activity of which the mice are capable; theways in which they learn to react

adaptively to new or novel situations; thefacility with which they acquire habits; theduration of habits; the roles of the varioussenses in the acquisition and performance

of certain habitual acts; the efficiency ofdifferent methods of training; and theinheritance of racial and individuallyacquired forms of behavior

In the course of my experimental work Idiscovered, much to my surprise, that noaccurate and detailed account of this

curiously interesting animal existed in theEnglish language, and that in no otherlanguage were all the facts concerning itavailable in a single book This fact, inconnection with my appreciation of the

exceptional value of the dancer as a petand as material for the scientific study ofanimal behavior, has led me to supplementthe results of my own observation bypresenting in this little book a brief andnot too highly technical description of thegeneral characteristics and history of thedancer.

The purposes which I have had in mind as

I planned and wrote the book are three:first, to present directly, clearly, and

briefly the results of my investigation;second, to give as complete an account ofthe dancing mouse as a thorough study ofthe literature on the animal and long-

continued observation on my own partshould make possible; third, to provide asupplementary text-book on mammalian

behavior and on methods of studyinganimal behavior for use in connectionwith courses in Comparative Psychology,Comparative Physiology, and AnimalBehavior.

It is my conviction that the scientific study

of animal behavior and of animal mindcan be furthered more just at present byintensive special investigations than byextensive general books Methods ofresearch in this field are few and

surprisingly crude, for the majority ofinvestigators have been more deeplyinterested in getting results than in

perfecting methods In writing this account

of the dancing mouse I have attempted tolay as much stress upon the development

of my methods of work as upon the results

which the methods yielded In fact, I haveused the dancer as a means of exhibiting avariety of methods by which the behaviorand intelligence of animals may be

studied As it happens the dancer is anideal subject for the experimental study ofmany of the problems of animal behavior

It is small, easily cared for, readily tamed,harmless, incessantly active, and it lendsitself satisfactorily to a large number ofexperimental situations For laboratorycourses in Comparative Psychology orComparative Physiology it well mighthold the place which the frog now holds incourses in Comparative Anatomy

Gratefully, and with this expression of mythanks, I acknowledge my indebtedness toProfessor Hugo Münsterberg for placing

at my command the resources of the

Harvard Psychological Laboratory and foradvice and encouragement throughout myinvestigation; to Professor Edwin B Holtfor valuable assistance in more ways than

I can mention; to Professor Wallace C.Sabine for generous aid in connectionwith the experiments on hearing; to

Professor Theobald Smith for the

examination of pathological dancers; toMiss Mary C Dickerson for the

photographs of dancing mice which arereproduced in the frontispiece; to Mr.Frank Ashmore for additional photographswhich I have been unable to use in thisvolume; to Mr C H Toll for the

drawings for Figures 14 and 20; to

Doctors H W Rand and C S Berry forvaluable suggestions on the basis of a

critical reading of the proof sheets; and to

my wife, Ada Watterson Yerkes, forconstant aid throughout the experimentalwork and in the preparation of this

volume

R M Y.

CAMBRIDGE, MASSACHUSETTS,

August, 1907

Theories concerning the origin of the race:

selectional breeding; the inheritance of anacquired character; mutation, inheritance,and selectional breeding; pathologicalchanges; natural selection—Instances ofthe occurrence of dancers among otherkinds of mice—Results of crossing dancerwith other kinds of mice.

CHAPTER II

FEEDING, BREEDING, AND

DEVELOPMENT OF THE YOUNG

Methods of keeping and caring for dancers

—Cages, nest-boxes, and materials fornest—Cleansing cages—Food supply andfeeding—Importance of cleanliness,

warmth, and pure food—Relations of

males and females, fighting—The young,number in a litter—Care of young—

Course of development—Comparison ofyoung of dancer with young of commonmouse— Diary account of the course ofdevelopment of a typical litter of dancers

CHAPTER III

BEHAVIOR: DANCE MOVEMENTS

Dancing—Restlessness and excitability—Significance of restlessness— Forms ofdance: whirling, circling, and figure-eights—Direction of whirling and

circling: right whirlers, left whirlers, andmixed whirlers— Sex differences in

dancing—Time and periodicity of dancing

—Influence of light on activity—

Necessity for prolonged observation ofbehavior

CHAPTER IV

BEHAVIOR: EQUILIBRATION AND

DIZZINESS

Muscular coordination—Statements ofCyon and Zoth concerning behavior—Control of movements, orientation,

equilibration, movement on inclinedsurfaces, climbing—The tracks of thedancer—Absence of visual dizziness—Comparison of the behavior of the dancerwith that of the common mouse when theyare rotated in a cyclostat—Behavior of

blinded dancers (Cyon, Alexander andKreidl, Kishi)—Cyon's two types ofdancer— Phenomena of behavior forwhich structural bases are sought: dancemovements; lack of response to sounds;deficiency in equilibrational ability; lack

of visual and rotational dizziness

space perception—Condition of the

auditory organs—Condition of the

equilibrational organs—Condition of thesound-transmitting organs—The bearing

of the results of anatomical investigationsupon the facts of behavior

CHAPTER VI

THE SENSE OF HEARING

Experiments on hearing in the dancermade by Rawitz, by Panse, by Cyon, byAlexander and Kreidl, by Zoth, and byKishi—Hearing and the voice—

Methods of testing sensitiveness to sounds

—Results of tests with adults—

Importance of indirect method of

experimentation—Results of tests withyoung—The period of auditory

—Motives for discrimination and choice

—Punishment versus reward as an

incentive in animal experiments—Hunger

as an incentive—An electric stimulus as

an incentive—Conditions for brightness

vision tests— White-black vision—

The delicacy of brightness discrimination

—Methods of testing the dancer's ability

to detect slight differences in brightness—Results of tests with gray papers—

Relation of intensity of visual stimuli tothe threshold of discrimination—Weber'slaw apparatus and method of

experimentation— Results of Weber's lawtests—Practice effects, the training of

vision— Description of the behavior ofthe dancer in the discrimination box

THE SENSE OF SIGHT: COLOR VISION

Does the dancer see colors?—The box method of testing color vision—Waugh's food-box method—Results oftests—Tests by the use of colored papers

food-in the visual discrimfood-ination red vision—Blue-orange vision—

box—Yellow-Brightness vision versus color vision—

Brightness check tests—Green-blue vision

—Conclusions concerning color vision—Structure of the retina of the dancer and itssignificance

in mazes—Following labyrinth paths inthe dark—The relative importance ofvisual, olfactory, and kinaesthetic stimuli

—Conditions for the acquisition of amotor habit—Conditions for the execution

of an habitual act

CHAPTER XII

EDUCABILITY: METHODS OF LEARNING

The modifiability of behavior—

Educational value of experimental studies

of modifiability—Methods: the problemmethod; the labyrinth method; the

discrimination method—Relation ofmethod to characteristics of animal—Simple test of the docility of the dancer—Lack of imitative tendency— Persistence

of useless acts—Manner of profiting byexperience—Individual differences ininitiative

Preliminary tests—Comparison of thebehavior of the dancer in a maze with that

of the common mouse—Evolution of alabyrinth method—Records of time andrecords of errors—Simple and effectivemethod of recording the path—Curves ofhabit formation—Regular and irregularlabyrinths—Points for a standard labyrinth

—Values and defects of the labyrinthmethod

Results of systematic habit-forming

experiments—Curves of habit formation

—Meaning of irregularity in curve—Individual differences—Comparison ofcurves for discrimination habits withthose for labyrinth habits—Averages—The index of modifiability as a measure ofdocility—Reliability of the index

the efficiency of discrimination methods—Comparison by means of indices of

modifiability—Number of tests per seriesversus number of series—Efficiency asmeasured by memory tests

CHAPTER XVI

THE DURATION OF HABITS: MEMORY AND RE-LEARNING

Measures of the permanency of

modifications in behavior—The duration

of brightness and color discriminationhabits—The relation of learning to re-learning—Can a habit which has been lostcompletely be re-acquired with greaterfacility than it was originally acquired?—

Relation of special training to generalefficiency—Does the training in one form

of labyrinth aid the dancer in acquiringother labyrinth habits?

—Sex differences in docility and

initiative— Individual differences ofmotor capacity which seem to indicatevarieties—Is the dancer pathological?

3 Double cages in frame

4 Photographs of dancers climbing (AfterZoth)

5 Tracks of common mouse (After

Alexander and Kreidl)

6 Tracks of dancer (After Alexander andKreidl)

7 The inner ear of the rabbit (Retzius)

8 The membranous labyrinth of the ear ofthe dancer (After Rawitz)

13 Ear of the dancer (After Kishi)

14 Discrimination box

15 Ground plan of discrimination box

16 Nendel's gray papers

17 Weber's law apparatus

18 Food-box apparatus

19 Waugh's food-box apparatus

20 Color discrimination apparatus

21 Ground plan of color discriminationapparatus

22 Cards for form discrimination

MOUSE

1 ALEXANDER, G UND KREIDL, A

"Zur Physiologie des Labyrinths der

Tanzmaus." Archiv für die gesammte

Physiologie, Bd 82: 541-552 1900.

2 ALEXANDER, G UND KREIDL, A

"Anatomisch-physiologische Studien überdas Ohrlabyrinth der Tanzmaus." II

Mittheilung Archiv für die gesammte

Physiologie Bd 88: 509-563 1902.

3 ALEXANDER, G UND KREIDL, A

"Anatomisch-physiologische Studien überdas Ohrlabyrinth der Tanzmaus." III

Mittheilung Archiv für die gesammte

rats." Proceedings of the Zoölogical

Society of London, Vol 2: 71-99 1903.

6 BREHM, A E "Tierleben." DritteAuflage Saugetiere, Bd 2: 513-514.1890

7 BREHM, A E "Life of Animals."Translated from the third German edition

of the "Tierleben" by G R Schmidtlein.Mammalia, p 338 Marquis, Chicago.1895.

8 CYON, E DE "Le sens de l'espacechez les souris dansantes japonaises."

Cinquantenaire de la Société de Biologie

(Volume jubilaire) p 544-546 Paris.1899

9 CYON, E VON "Ohrlabyrinth,

Raumsinn und Orientirung." Archiv für die

gesammte Physiologie, Bd 79: 211-302.

1900

10 CYON, E DE "Presentation de souris

dansantes japonaises." Comptes rendus

du XIII Congrès International de Paris, Section de physiologie, p 160-161 1900.

11 CYON, E VON "Beiträge zur

Physiologie des Raumsinns." I Theil

"Neue Beobachtungen an den japanischen

Tanzmäusen." Archiv für die gesammte

Physiologie, Bd 89: 427-453 1902.

12 CYON, E DE "Le sens de l'espace."Richet's "Dictionnaire de physiologie," T.5: 570-571 1901

13 DARBISHIRE, A D Note on theresults of crossing Japanese waltzing mice

with European albino races Biometrica,

Vol 2: 101-104 1902

14 DARBISHIRE, A D Second report

on the result of crossing Japanese waltzingmice with European albino races

Biometrica, Vol.2: 165-173 1903.

15 DARBISHIRE, A D Third report onhybrids between waltzing mice and albino

races Biometrica, Vol 2: 282-285 1903.

16 DARBISHIRE, A D On the result ofcrossing Japanese waltzing with albino

mice Biometrica, Vol 3: 1-51 1904.

17 GUAITA, G v "Versuche mit

Kreuzungen von verschiedenen Rassen der

Hausmaus." Berichte der

naturforschenden Gesellschaft zu

Freiburg i B., Bd 10: 317-332 1898.

18 GUAITA, G v "Zweite Mitteilunguber Versuche mit Kreuzungen von

verschiedenen Hausmausrassen." Berichte

der naturforschenden Gesellschaft zu Freiburg i B., Bd 11: 131-138 1900.

19 HAACKE, W "Ueber Wesen,

Ursachen und Vererbung von Albinismusund Scheckung und über deren Bedeutungfür vererbungstheoretische und

entwicklungsmechanische Fragen."

Biologisches Centralblatt, Bd 15: 44-78.

1895

19a HUNTER, M S "A Pair of Waltzing

Mice." The Century Magazine, Vol 73:

21 KISHI, K "Das Gehörorgan der

sogenannten Tanzmaus." Zeitschrift für

22a LOSE, J "Waltzing Mice." Country

Life in America, September, 1904 p 447.

23 PANSE, R Zu Herrn Bernhard

Rawitz' Arbeit: "Das Gehörorgan der

japanischen Tanzmäuse." Archiv für

Anatomie und Physiologie,

Physiologische Abtheilung, 1901: 140

139-24 PANSE, R "Das Gleichgewichts- und