| We have chosen the word integrative to describe our approach,
which is intended to be an alternative to the current trend toward overspecialization in scientific training. To be integrative is to study behavior from several perspectives simultaneously, that is, to ask how an animal initiates and
completes its motor patterns as well as why it elects to behave that way in the first place. Students of integration ask about the adaptive function of a behavior while simultaneously studying the developmental or physiological
mechanisms that underlie it. They might, for example, take to the field to study the spatial learning abilities of a set of closely related bird species inhabiting different environments and then return to the neuroanatomy of these species --
all against a background of concern for how learning evolves and develops. |
Why study behavior in this integrative way? Among many reasons, we believe that an interdisciplinary and synthetic approach to science
promotes more rapid development and new insights. For example, the relation of brain to behavior is one of the last great biological
mysteries and its solution will require an integrative approach. In a practical and a moral sense, a greater understanding of how animals
perceive and respond to their environments is critical if we are to anticipate accurately the needs of animals as they confront a rapidly
changing planet. Finally, serious and integrative study of the intriguing parallels between human and animal behavior is one of the important
ways to increase understanding of ourselves. In sum, we offer you the opportunity to study animal behavior in a new and exciting way by
joining a productive group of ecologists, evolutionary biologists, neural scientists, and psychologists, all focused on a synthetic approach to
the study of behavior. |