Author Description

This dictionary covers the discoveries and theories that have evolved to explain the behavior of nonhuman animals, concentrating particularly on ethological ideas and on studies of animals in their natural habitat. The entries discuss basic organic processes as well as the more social topics, and provide thorough coverage of the development of the ideas and approaches of ethologists, sociobiologists, and learning theorists. There are articles on such topics as conditioning, reinforcement, and preparedness. Dictionary of Animal Behavior and Learning is one of four dictionaries based on the Encyclopedic Dictionary of Psychology, published by The MIT Press in 1983 and cited by American Libraries as an outstanding reference source that speaks to the specialist and nonspecialist alike. They update existing articles while offering many new entries.