The Dancing Mouse: A Study in Animal Behavior

Peculiarities of the dancing mouse--Markings and method of keeping record of individuals--The dancer in China and Japan (Kishi, Mitsukuri, Hatai)-- Theories concerning the origi...

Methods of keeping and caring for dancers--Cages, nest-boxes, and materials for nest--Cleansing cages--Food supply and feeding--Importance of cleanliness, warmth, and pure food-...

Dancing--Restlessness and excitability--Significance of restlessness-- Forms of dance: whirling, circling, and figure-eights--Direction of whirling and circling: right whirlers,...

Muscular coordination--Statements of Cyon and Zoth concerning behavior-- Control of movements, orientation, equilibration, movement on inclined surfaces, climbing--The tracks of...

The functions of the ear--Structure of the ear of the dancer as described by Rawitz, by Panse, by Baginsky, by Alexander and Kreidl, and by Kishi-- Cyon's theory of the relation...

Experiments on hearing in the dancer made by Rawitz, by Panse, by Cyon, by Alexander and Kreidl, by Zoth, and by Kishi--Hearing and the voice-- Methods of testing sensitiveness...

What is known concerning sight in the dancer--Brightness vision and color vision--Methods of testing brightness vision, the visual discrimination apparatus--Motives for discrimi...

The delicacy of brightness discrimination--Methods of testing the dancer's ability to detect slight differences in brightness--Results of tests with gray papers--Relation of int...

Does the dancer see colors?--The food-box method of testing color vision-- Waugh's food-box method--Results of tests--Tests by the use of colored papers in the visual discrimina...

The use of color filters--Testing color vision by the use of transmitted light--Green-blue vision--Green-red vision--Blue-red vision--Stimulating value of different portions of...

Sight and general behavior--Behavior of blinded dancers--Experimental tests of ability to perceive form--Visual guidance in mazes--Following labyrinth paths in the dark--The rel...

The modifiability of behavior--Educational value of experimental studies of modifiability--Methods: the problem method; the labyrinth method; the discrimination method--Relation...

The labyrinth method--Problems--Preliminary tests--Comparison of the behavior of the dancer in a maze with that of the common mouse--Evolution of a labyrinth method--Records of...

Quantitative _versus_ qualitative results--Motives--Precautions-- Preference--Results of systematic habit-forming experiments--Curves of habit formation--Meaning of irregularity...

Importance of measuring the efficiency of educational methods--Rapidity of learning and permanency of modifications wrought by training--Results of a study of the efficiency of...

Measures of the permanency of modifications in behavior--The duration of brightness and color discrimination habits--The relation of learning to re-learning--Can a habit which h...

Individual peculiarities in sensitiveness, docility, and initiative--The relation of docility to age--The individual result and the average--How averages conceal facts--Sex diff...

The variety of mouse which is known as the Japanese dancing or waltzing mouse has been of special interest to biologists and to lovers of pets because of its curious movements....

In this chapter I shall report, for the benefit of those who may wish to know how to take care of dancing mice, my experience in keeping and breeding the animals, and my observa...

The peculiarities of behavior of the dancing mouse are responsible alike for the widespread interest which it has aroused, and for its name. In a little book on fancy varieties...

Quite as interesting and important as the general facts of behavior which we have been considering are the results of experimental tests of the dancer's ability to maintain its...

The activities of an animal are expressions of changes which occur in its structure, and they can be explained satisfactorily only when the facts of structure are known. Such pe...

Repeatedly in the foregoing chapters mention has been made of the dancer's irresponsiveness to sounds, but it has not been definitely stated whether this peculiarity of behavior...

The sense of sight in the dancer has received little attention hitherto. In the literature there are a few casual statements to the effect that it is of importance. Zoth, for ex...

Since the ability of the dancer to perceive brightness has been demonstrated by the experiments of the previous chapter, the next step in this investigation of the nature of vis...

used, in an apparatus which will be described later. Either of these methods might have been used for the solution of both problems. Which of them is the more satisfactory is de...

Is the dancing mouse able to discriminate colors as we do? Does it possess anything which may properly be called color vision? If so, what is the nature of its ability in this s...

In all of the color experiments, unless otherwise stated, a series of ten tests each day was given, until satisfactory evidence of discrimination or proof of the lack of the abi...

This may mean that they prefer the lower degree of brightness or illumination, and if so it might be argued, in turn, that the orange was chosen by No. 3 because it appeared dar...

There are three well-known ways in which colors may be used as stimuli in experiments on animals: by the use of colored papers (reflected light); by the use of a prism (the spec...

Darting hither and thither in its cage, whirling rapidly, now to the left, now to the right, running in circles, passing through holes in the nest box quickly and neatly, the da...

Immediately after the two males _A_ and _B_ had been given the "food-box" tests, whose results appear in Table 15, they were tested in the same apparatus and by the same method...

Nearly all of the experiments described in earlier chapters have revealed facts concerning the educability of the dancer. In order to supplement the knowledge of this subject th...

The problem method, of which the ladder and door-opening tests of the preceding chapter are examples, has yielded interesting results concerning the individual initiative, ingen...

Discrimination is demanded of an animal in almost all forms of the problem and labyrinth methods, as well as in what I have chosen to call the discrimination method. In the latt...

The nature of the modifications which are wrought in the behavior of an organism varies with the method of training. This fact is recognized by human educators, as well as by st...

The effects of training gradually disappear. Habits wane with disuse. In the dancer, it is not possible to establish with certainty the existence of memory in the introspective...

All dancers are alike in certain important respects, but to the trained observer of animal behavior their individual peculiarities are quite as evident, and even more interestin...

In a general way those peculiarities of behavior which suggested the name dancing mouse are inherited. Generation after generation of the mice run in circles, whirl, and move th...