Animal Behavior in Introductory Textbooks: Consensus on Topics, Confusion over Terms

Abstract

I surveyed chapters on animal behavior in 11 introductory textbooks to see how well textbooks introduce current research in the field. Chapters on animal behavior were placed in or near the sections on ecology and often near sections on animals. Within chapters, the introductory textbooks tended to present the same topics in a standard sequence. This sequence generally agrees with the sequence of chapters in an advanced textbook. Textbooks showed little consistency, however, in the terms they presented in boldface type. Different textbooks presented different terms in boldface type, so most “essential terms” were featured in only one textbook. Terms in boldface from introductory textbooks were not often used in an advanced textbook or research articles in animal behavior. Textbooks rarely showed alternative hypotheses or data from control groups when presenting animal behavior. Textbooks seem to present an abundance of unnecessary terms and miss the opportunity to illustrate the process of science using observations of animals.