ANIMAL BEHAVIOR 853 



interpretation, and psychologists today are seeking to leave out all 

 such terms in the study of animal behavior. 



Most of the behavior of animals can be explained on the basis of 

 tropisms, reflexes, chain reflexes, and conditioned reflexes used in the 

 formation of habits. In most cases the other animals' capacity to 

 form conditioned reflexes and handle themselves in a complex environ- 

 ment is much more limited than in the average man. Whether the 

 higher animals, other than man, can reason is a question that has been 

 much debated. Reasoning is a term upon which there is not unanimous 

 agreement as to meaning. If it merely means problem solving, one 

 would say the individual is able to reason because most higher ani- 

 mals can solve a problem if the problem is suited to the animal. If 

 reasoning involves the use of symbolic processes or abstract ideas, 

 then we are much more in doubt. 



The cases of so-called intelligent animals such as "Clever Hans" 

 and "The Horses of Elberfield," when examined by comparative 

 psychologists were found to be making use of motor cues, and these 

 had been conditioned by trainers. These so-called intelligent horses 

 could add, subtract, multiply, divide, and extract square root and 

 cube root. They could solve difficult problems, as well as easy ones — 

 but they could not give correct responses when answers were unknown 

 to experimenters and audiences. Reasoning could not be accredited to 

 them. 



In Hunter's experiments on delayed reaction, the rats and dogs suc- 

 ceeded in going immediately to the lighted box after a period of de- 

 lay only when the body or a part of the body was kept oriented to- 

 ward the lighted box. The monkeys and children were able to succeed 

 when the body was not oriented, thus giving evidence of the use of 

 some other process than bodily orientation. 



If we hold to the definition that reasoning involves the use of sym- 

 bolic processes, there is little evidence of reasoning in animals, other 

 than human. 



