lorenz

• geese eggs separated into 2 groups for hatching

  1. with mother
  2. in incubator
• lorenz ensured that he was the first moving object the newly hatched geese encountered
• When the geese hatched Lorenz imitated a mother duck’s quacking sound, and the geese regarded him as their mother and followed him accordingly. The other group followed the mother goose.
• Lorenz found that geese follow the first moving object they see, known as imprinting - suggests that attachment is innate and programmed genetically
• To ensure imprinting had occurred, Lorenz put all the geese together under an upturned box and allowed them to mix.  When the box was removed, the two groups separated to go to their respective “mothers” – half to the goose, and half to Lorenz.
• X unethical - using animals
• X can it explain complex human behaviours?
• imprinting occurs within a critical period, and if an offspring is not exposed to a moving object during this time, they will fail to form an attachment