IRENAUS EIBL-EIBESFELDT 69 



GROUP DISCUSSION 



EiBL-EiBESFELDT. Wc saw that learning plays an important role in the integration 

 of innate behavioural elements into a functional whole. If we study such learning 

 processes, we find that many animals are capable of learning certain tasks very 

 rapidly. These arc supposed to be of biological importance to them. Is tliis rapid 

 learning a specific talent based on central nervous structures adapted to that special 

 task during evolution or is it due to a special high motivational pressure? 



Galambos. Dr Eibl-Eibcsfcldt asks if this is the result of prime motivation or of a 

 special adaptive mechanism. Would you please elaborated 



EiBL-EiBESFELDT. When I studied the prey-hunting behaviour in the common 

 toad, I found that this animal, which normally does not learn very fast, learns 

 rapidly to distinguish between palatable and unpalatable foods. If it gets stung by a 

 wasp or if it receives unpalatable food it needs only very few experiences to avoid 

 such prey in the future. Is this rapid learning based on specially adapted structures 

 of the C.N.S. or is it just due to an especially high motivational pressure? Would 

 they learn other tasks just as fast if a similar pressure was put on them? Are there 

 experiments where animals learned the same tasks under different motivation? 



Olds. We have experiments where certain animals learned complicated and 

 unusual behaviour patterns. We worked with rodents too. Provided the animal by 

 its behaviour could turn on an electrical stimulus to the hypothalamus — the 

 animal learned with great speed, provided the stimulus was in the right part of the 

 hypothalamus. The same animal looked very stupid if we turned the stimulus down 

 so that it was barely above threshold. This will be clarified later when I give my 

 paper. 



Hebb. I thought Dr Eibl-Eibestcldt was disagreeing with the idea that there is any 

 role of learning in the instinctive patterns ot behaviour. The experiments he has 

 described clearly support the idea that learning and the constitutional structure of 

 the animal collaborate closely, and that we are not dealing with two different and 

 totally unrelated sorts of processes. We must not distinguish instinctive processes 

 from processes influenced by experience. 



It is my impression that we have agreement in principle on the question. I have 

 not talked to Riess, but I am sure that Lehrmann would not disagree with any of 

 your propositions today. It would be ridiculous to suppose today that there are no 

 innate mechanisms, no laid-down patterns of response. What I add, reinforced by 

 your paper, is that those laid-down patterns are what are modified by the effects 

 of experience. In some animals little modification, in others much. The lower 

 animal particularly is built to learn a few things and he learns them quickly. If this 

 is the essence of the notion of instinct, this and the tendency to act in certain direc- 

 tions, I suggest that man's behaviour also is essentially instinctive. We are so 

 conscious of individual differences that we do not see the extraordinary uniformities 

 that occur through all human cultures. 



Eibl-Eibesfeldt. If you read Lehrmann's paper you will sec that he does not 

 agree with all these concepts. There are certain behaviour patterns which are innate 

 in the sense that they develop in the animal without certain types of learning being 

 involved. We do not imply that experience plays no role at all. Lehrmann has 

 defined experience as every impact of external stimuli on the development of 

 behaviour, formative processes and so on. We agree that all these can influence 



