236 



The Animal Mind 



than might otherwise have been the case (273); and this 

 may have been to a certain extent true. In testing monkeys 

 with puzzle boxes Thorndike placed the food on the 

 inside and the monkeys on the outside. He found a 

 marked difference between the speed of their learning and 



that shown by the cats and 

 dogs. " Whereas the latter 

 were practically unanimous, i 

 save in the cases of the very i 

 easiest performances, in show- 

 ing a process of gradual learn- 

 ing by a gradual elimination 

 of unsuccessful movements 

 and a gradual reinforcement 

 of the successful one, these are 



FIG. 1 8. Combination fastening used 'unanimous, Save in the very 

 in Kinnaman's work on monkeys. , , . 



The figures indicate the order in hardest, in Showing a prOCCSS 

 which the parts of the combination of Sudden acquisition by a 



rapid, often apparently instan- 

 taneous abandonment of the unsuccessful movements and 

 selection of the appropriate one, which rivals in suddenness 

 the selections made by human beings in similar perform- 

 ances " (397). Kinnaman further complicated the box tests 

 with his Macacus monkeys by constructing "combination" 

 fastenings, which required the performance of a set of actions 

 in a certain order, and found that these were mastered by 

 the animals (221) (Fig. 18). 



Cole's work on the raccoon, finally, indicates that in speed 

 of learning this animal stands " almost midway between the 

 monkey and the cat," while "in the complexity of the associa- 

 tions it is able to form it stands nearer the monkey." The 

 raccoons, like the monkeys, learned combination locks, 

 although they did not learn to perform the various move- 



