252 Animal Intelligence 
Other cases of imitation are mere adjuncts to the ordinary 
process of habit-formation. In the first place, the act of an- 
other, or its result, may serve as a model by which the satis- 
fyingness of one’s own responses are determined. Just as 
the touch and taste of food tells a baby that he has got it 
safely into his mouth, so the sound of a word spoken by an- 
other or the sight of another performing some act of skill 
tells us whether our pronunciation or technique is right or 
wrong. 
In the second place, the perception of another’s act may 
serve as a stimulus to a response whereby the situation is 
altered into one to which the animal responds from habit by 
an act like the one perceived. For example, the perception 
of another making a certain response (A) to a situation (B) 
may lead in me by the laws of habit to a response (C) 
which puts me in a situation (D) such that the response (A) 
is made by me by the laws of habit. Suppose that by pre- 
vious training the act of taking off my hat (A) has become 
connected as response to the situation (D), ‘ thought of hat 
off,’ and suppose that with the sight of others uncovering 
their heads (A) in church (B) there has, again by previous 
habituation, been connected, as response (C), ‘thought of 
hat off.’ Then the sight of others uncovering their heads 
would by virtue of the laws of habit lead me to uncover. 
Imitation of this sort, where the perception of the act or 
condition in another gives rise to the idea of performing the 
act or attaining the condition, the idea in turn giving rise 
to the appropriate act, is certainly very common. 
There may be cases of imitation which cannot be thus 
accounted for as special instinctive responses to the percep- 
tion of certain acts by the same acts, as habits formed under 
the condition that the satisfyingness of a response is its 
likeness to the perceived act of another, or as the connection 
