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dc.contributor.authorBurghardt, Gordon M.
dc.date.accessioned2022-02-21T15:09:57Z
dc.date.available2022-02-21T15:09:57Z
dc.date.issued2006
dc.identifierONIX_20220221_9780262269551_18
dc.identifier.urihttps://directory.doabooks.org/handle/20.500.12854/78498
dc.description.abstractIn The Genesis of Animal Play, Gordon Burghardt examines the origins and evolution of play in humans and animals. He asks what play might mean in our understanding of evolution, the brain, behavioral organization, and psychology. Is play essential to development? Is it the driving force behind human and animal behavior? What is the proper place for the study of play in the cognitive, behavioral, and biological sciences? The engaging nature of play—who does not enjoy watching a kitten attack a ball of yarn?—has made it difficult to study. Some scholars have called play undefinable, nonexistent, or a mystery outside the realm of scientific analysis. Using the comparative perspectives of ethology and psychology, The Genesis of Animal Play goes further than other studies in reviewing the evidence of play throughout the animal kingdom, from human babies to animals not usually considered playful. Burghardt finds that although playfulness may have been essential to the origin of much that we consider distinctive in human (and mammalian) behavior, it only develops through a specific set of interactions among developmental, evolutionary, ecological, and physiological processes. Furthermore, play is not always beneficial or adaptive. Part I offers a detailed discussion of play in placental mammals (including children) and develops an integrative framework called surplus resource theory. The most fascinating and most controversial sections of the book, perhaps, are in the seven chapters in part II in which Burghardt presents evidence of playfulness in such unexpected groups of animals as kangaroos, birds, lizards, and "Fish That Leap, Juggle, and Tease." Burghardt concludes by considering the implications of the diversity of play for future research, and suggests that understanding the origin and development of play can shape our view of society and its accomplishments through history.
dc.languageEnglish
dc.relation.ispartofseriesA Bradford Book
dc.subject.classificationbic Book Industry Communication::J Society & social sciences::JM Psychology::JMT States of consciousness::JMTK Drug-induced states
dc.subject.otherCognition and cognitive psychology
dc.titleThe Genesis of Animal Play
dc.title.alternativeTesting the Limits
dc.typebook
oapen.identifier.doi10.7551/mitpress/3229.001.0001
oapen.relation.isPublishedByae0cf962-f685-4933-93d1-916defa5123d
oapen.relation.isbn9780262269551
oapen.relation.isbn9780262025430
oapen.imprintA Bradford Book
oapen.pages520
oapen.place.publicationCambridge


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