LITERATURE FOR 1912 ON THE BEHAVIOR OF 



VERTEBRATES 



JOHN B. WATSON AND K. S. LASHLEY* 



VISION 



Fish. Loeb (16) discusses briefly the problem of color and 

 pattern adaptation in the flat-fish. He is inclined to accept the 

 suggestion of Munk and Henschen that in vision there is formed 

 an image, not only upon the retina, but also upon the cortex, 

 and to develop such a view even farther. Taking as a founda- 

 tion the work of Sumner in which it was shown that the flounder 

 was able to reproduce rather complicated patterns upon its 

 skin, Loeb assumes a point for point correspondence between 

 the retinal image and the pattern formed upon the skin. The 

 mechanism of this process is expressed in two sentences: — "Es 

 liegt nahe, anzunehmen, dass jeder Punkt des Retinabildes ein 

 Reizpunkt ist, welcher einen entsprechenden Bildpunkt durch 

 Vermittlung einer Nervenfaser in den primaren Optikusganglien 

 hervorruft. Jeder Bildpunkt in den primaren Optikusganglien 

 kann wieder als Reizpunkt angesehen werden, der durch Ver- 

 mittlung einer besonderen Nervenfaser eine einzelne Cromato- 

 phore der Haut oder eine kleine Gruppe derselben in einem 

 bestimmten Sinne beeinflusst." While such an explanation may 

 prove useful by suggesting experimental procedure, the sup- 

 porting evidence advanced is too meagre to give it value save 

 as a working hypothesis. 



Goldsmith (7^) reports further experiments upon visual 

 memory in fish, claiming to have confirmed with three other 

 species, her results of 1905. 



New objects always frighten Gobius and Gasterosteus, but 

 once having received food from forceps, the fish readily return, 

 although still shy of a new object. She concludes that these 

 fish retain "the memory of the aspect of objects along with 

 that of their topographical situation." 



Color experiments were carried on in two ways. 1. Colored 

 papers were used on the bottom and sides of a glass basin. 



* With the assistance of Ruth J. Stocking and Helen B. Hubbert. 



446 



