LIMITS OF COMPARATIVE PSYCHOLOGY 733 



tation, for example, the imitations involved in the so-called social 

 life of insects, 1 fall into two classes: they are either fortuitous 

 repetitions of actions instinctive in a large group of animals, and 

 in this case, they are not in any true sense imitations, or they are 

 merely mechanical imitations, known as such by the observers, not 

 by the performers, in which the action of one animal serves as 

 direct stimulus of another animal's act. Reflective imitation on the 

 other hand, implies the purpose of the imitator to model his own 

 act on that of another self. 2 Among recorded cases of animal imita- 

 tion, Hachet-Souplet's record of dogs who imitate the trainer's 

 voice, 3 and Kinnaman's 4 account of his monkey's imitation of its 

 fellow, represent what seems most like reflective imitation; yet 

 neither case is decisive. An objective test of imitation of this 

 sort, and of the correlated experience, reflective opposition to other 

 selves, would, however, be so hard to find, that it is not fair to 

 deduce merely from the lack of proof the positive impossibility of 

 the experience. It is still less justifiable to base an argument against 

 the occurrence of animal imitation on the fact, 5 noted by Thorndike, 

 that animals fail, often, to perform actions which the experimenter 

 or a fellow animal has repeatedly performed in their presence. For 

 in these cases, it is likely that attention, certainly a prerequisite to 

 imitation, is distracted. 



A discussion of the scope of child psychology, were there time 

 to introduce it, would follow a similar plan. The first question of 

 child psychology differs, however, from the initial problem of ani- 

 mal psychology. There is no reason to ask: What children are 

 conscious? For there is here no question of different species, but 

 only of different individuals. In other words, it is generally ad- 

 mitted that all normal human beings, at some period of their de- 

 velopment, become capable of both sorts of learning through in- 

 dividual experience, first, learning by trial and error in dealing 

 with concrete situations; second, learning by analysis of these 

 same situations. It is admitted also that all normal human 

 beings develop in the social fashion, by reflective imitation and 

 opposition, both concrete and analytic. The basal question of gen- 

 etic child psychology is, therefore, at what age is a child proved to 

 be conscious? The method of solving the problem has already been 

 indicated. As that animal which reacts adaptivelyis thereby proved 

 to be conscious, so a child is proved to be conscious at that age at 



1 Cf. Wasmann, op. cit., chap. 1. 



2 For development of the doctrine that imitation is primarily personal, cf. 

 J. Royce, Century Magazine, 1894; also, the writer's An Introduction to Psych- 

 ology, p. 341. 



3 Op. cit., p. 106. 



4 Op. cit., American Journal of Psychology, xin, pp. 122 and 199. 



5 Animal Intelligence, pp. 60-62; The Mental Life of Monkeys, pp. 34 seq. 

 Cf. Hobhouse, op. cit., pp. 148 seq. 



