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Aggresion, dominance, and individual spacing
Behavioural Processes, 4 (1979) 273-280 o Elsevier Scientific Publishing Company, Amsterdam -- Printed in The Netherlands
213
Book Reviews HUMAN AND ANIMAL BEHAVIOUR:
RESEARCH
REPORTS
Dominance, and Individual Spacing. L. Krames, P. Pliner and T. Alloway (Editors). Advances in the Study of Communication and Affect, Vol. 4. Plenum Publishing Company, New York, N.Y., London, 1978, 173 pp., US$ 27.00, ISBN o-306-359-04-9.
Aggresion,
A clear sense of direction guided by a strong editorial hand is needed to give coherence to a book composed of articles on divergent topics from different scientific fields. In addition to the book now reviewed, the three Canadian editors, Lester Krames, Patricia Pliner and Thomas Alloway have edited three other volumes in the same series with the broad title: “Advances in the Study of Communication and Affect”. In this fourth volume there are eight chapters written by six authors from Canada and three from the United States. No editorial comments relate the ideas of one chapter to those elsewhere. The topics that the chapters deal with are: the relationship between the size of antlers, combat strategy and ecological distribution in ungulates; vocalization in the black spider monkey; bird song and territorial behavior; the effects of crowding; the expression of emotion by the human face; social play at pre-school age; cyclic changes in populations of small rodents and their connexion with agonistic behavior; and the meaning of evil in human society. A fair knowledge of different fields of biology and psychology is expected from the reader in order to profit from the text. For instance, the first article in the book, written by Valerius Geist, takes the standpoint of evolutionism. The concepts of ‘reason’ and ‘cause’ refer to evolutionary causation which is different from the causation concepts of some other articles in the book. Most of the articles are, however, valuable in their own area and provide some fresh and interesting insights. This is, of course, the least that can be expected for publication of a book like this to be justified. The data are generally based on careful and imaginatively planned experimentation. The articles by J. Bruce Falls on bird song and territorial behavior, by Charles J. Krebs on aggression, dispersal, and cyclic changes in populations of small rodents, by Valerius Geist on weapons, combat, and ecology, and by J.F. Eisenberg on vocal communication in primates indicate that ethological research has become vigorous and interacts with other branches of science in interesting ways. The chapter on crowding by Jonathan L. Freedman gives the reader a grasp not only of the problems, but also - to some extent unintentionally of the difficulties in obtaining reliable and comparable information in this area. Contrary to popular belief, no evidence has been found supporting the
274
notion that crowding is harmful to people in any way. This is stated clearly by the author (p. 101). The methodological limitations of the research on human crowding - also reflected in this chapter - are, however, not emphasized by the writer. To be ‘crowded’ in a laboratory room for some hours during an experiment is not equivalent to the conditions of animal crowding experiments, and accordingly the results cannot be expected to be the same. An equivalent situation would be to have to live day and night for long periods in a crowded room without the opportunity of escape or the prospect of any privacy. In general, the failure of traditional experimen tal methods and even of field experiments (although for other reasons) to give valid answers to broad human problems, has not been sufficiently recognized in actual research work, although it has been repeatedly expressed in theoretical discussions. The chapter by Rona Abramovitch and Fred Strayer on preschool social behavior is based on work performed by the two authors in different laboratories. Their work has been combined in this interesting article. The observations are made in the ethological frame of reference which has shown a quite useful approach to child psychology. Its connexions with traditional child or developmental psychology should, however, not be forgotten. For instance, familiarity with the work of Dan Olweus in Norway on the socalled ‘mobbing’ behavior in child groups could have been fruitful for the discussion of some of the results. The last chapter, written by Philip G. Zimbardo, is out of place in this book. It contains a set of general statements on some aspects of aggressiveness, here called evil. It is not easy to see its connexion with the other articles in the book. There is a methodological and conceptual gap between empirical ethological research on aggression and the psychodynamic and semipopular articles written on the topic. It should be expected from writers and editors of collections like this that they try to integrate these two viewpoints. The integration should take place preferably in the articles themselves, but if not, at least through editorial comment and discussion. It is improbable that many readers will make the effort to read through the whole book. However, the quality of many of the articles will make them a valuable reference for scientists in several fields. KIRSTI M.J. LAGERSPETZ (Turku, Finland)
213
Book Reviews HUMAN AND ANIMAL BEHAVIOUR:
RESEARCH
REPORTS
Dominance, and Individual Spacing. L. Krames, P. Pliner and T. Alloway (Editors). Advances in the Study of Communication and Affect, Vol. 4. Plenum Publishing Company, New York, N.Y., London, 1978, 173 pp., US$ 27.00, ISBN o-306-359-04-9.
Aggresion,
A clear sense of direction guided by a strong editorial hand is needed to give coherence to a book composed of articles on divergent topics from different scientific fields. In addition to the book now reviewed, the three Canadian editors, Lester Krames, Patricia Pliner and Thomas Alloway have edited three other volumes in the same series with the broad title: “Advances in the Study of Communication and Affect”. In this fourth volume there are eight chapters written by six authors from Canada and three from the United States. No editorial comments relate the ideas of one chapter to those elsewhere. The topics that the chapters deal with are: the relationship between the size of antlers, combat strategy and ecological distribution in ungulates; vocalization in the black spider monkey; bird song and territorial behavior; the effects of crowding; the expression of emotion by the human face; social play at pre-school age; cyclic changes in populations of small rodents and their connexion with agonistic behavior; and the meaning of evil in human society. A fair knowledge of different fields of biology and psychology is expected from the reader in order to profit from the text. For instance, the first article in the book, written by Valerius Geist, takes the standpoint of evolutionism. The concepts of ‘reason’ and ‘cause’ refer to evolutionary causation which is different from the causation concepts of some other articles in the book. Most of the articles are, however, valuable in their own area and provide some fresh and interesting insights. This is, of course, the least that can be expected for publication of a book like this to be justified. The data are generally based on careful and imaginatively planned experimentation. The articles by J. Bruce Falls on bird song and territorial behavior, by Charles J. Krebs on aggression, dispersal, and cyclic changes in populations of small rodents, by Valerius Geist on weapons, combat, and ecology, and by J.F. Eisenberg on vocal communication in primates indicate that ethological research has become vigorous and interacts with other branches of science in interesting ways. The chapter on crowding by Jonathan L. Freedman gives the reader a grasp not only of the problems, but also - to some extent unintentionally of the difficulties in obtaining reliable and comparable information in this area. Contrary to popular belief, no evidence has been found supporting the
274
notion that crowding is harmful to people in any way. This is stated clearly by the author (p. 101). The methodological limitations of the research on human crowding - also reflected in this chapter - are, however, not emphasized by the writer. To be ‘crowded’ in a laboratory room for some hours during an experiment is not equivalent to the conditions of animal crowding experiments, and accordingly the results cannot be expected to be the same. An equivalent situation would be to have to live day and night for long periods in a crowded room without the opportunity of escape or the prospect of any privacy. In general, the failure of traditional experimen tal methods and even of field experiments (although for other reasons) to give valid answers to broad human problems, has not been sufficiently recognized in actual research work, although it has been repeatedly expressed in theoretical discussions. The chapter by Rona Abramovitch and Fred Strayer on preschool social behavior is based on work performed by the two authors in different laboratories. Their work has been combined in this interesting article. The observations are made in the ethological frame of reference which has shown a quite useful approach to child psychology. Its connexions with traditional child or developmental psychology should, however, not be forgotten. For instance, familiarity with the work of Dan Olweus in Norway on the socalled ‘mobbing’ behavior in child groups could have been fruitful for the discussion of some of the results. The last chapter, written by Philip G. Zimbardo, is out of place in this book. It contains a set of general statements on some aspects of aggressiveness, here called evil. It is not easy to see its connexion with the other articles in the book. There is a methodological and conceptual gap between empirical ethological research on aggression and the psychodynamic and semipopular articles written on the topic. It should be expected from writers and editors of collections like this that they try to integrate these two viewpoints. The integration should take place preferably in the articles themselves, but if not, at least through editorial comment and discussion. It is improbable that many readers will make the effort to read through the whole book. However, the quality of many of the articles will make them a valuable reference for scientists in several fields. KIRSTI M.J. LAGERSPETZ (Turku, Finland)