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Encyclopedia of Animal Cognition and Behavior pp 1–8Cite as

Behavior Systems

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Beginnings in Ethology

Nikolaas Tinbergen (1942) began to speak in terms of systems of behavior in his first manifesto of ethology. As there are systems of respiration and systems of digestion, for instance, in which multiple chores are accomplished in coordination by different parts to perform a complex function, there can be said to be systems of behavior that collectively accomplish complex chores such as feeding, finding mates, avoiding pain, and perhaps less obvious functions as well, such as play, grooming, or sociality. Tinbergen (1942) stressed that behavior has an organization and that this organization is hierarchical (Fig. 1).

Fig. 1
figure 1

Tinbergen’s 1942 hierarchy of moods model of the reproductive drive in stickleback fish (From Tinbergen 1942)

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Author information

Authors and Affiliations

  1. University of Minho, Gualtar, Portugal

    Robert Ian Bowers

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  1. Robert Ian Bowers
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Correspondence to Robert Ian Bowers .

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Editors and Affiliations

  1. Oakland University , Rochester, MI, USA

    Jennifer Vonk

  2. Department of Psychology, Oakland University Department of Psychology, Rochester, MI, USA

    Todd Shackelford

Section Editor information

  1. Hofstra University, Long Island, USA

    Oskar Pineno

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Bowers, R.I. (2019). Behavior Systems. In: Vonk, J., Shackelford, T. (eds) Encyclopedia of Animal Cognition and Behavior. Springer, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-47829-6_1232-2

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  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-47829-6_1232-2

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  • Print ISBN: 978-3-319-47829-6

  • Online ISBN: 978-3-319-47829-6

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Chapter history

  1. Latest

    Behavior Systems
    Published:
    26 December 2018

    DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-47829-6_1232-2

  2. Original

    Behavior Systems
    Published:
    03 May 2017

    DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-47829-6_1232-1

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