| Abstract: | Animal reaming research has increasingly used complex stimuli that approximate natural objects, events, and locations, a trend that has accompanied a resurgence of interest in the role of cognitive factors in reaming. Accounts of complex stimulus control have focused mainly on cognitive mechanisms and largely ignored the contribution of stimulus information to perception and memory for complex events. It is argued here that research on animal reaming stands to benefit from a more detailed consideration of the stimulus and that James Gibson's stimulus-centered theory of perception serves as a useful framework for analyses of complex stimuli. Several issues in the field of animal reaming and cognition are considered from the Gibsonian perspective on stimuli, including the fundamental problem of defining the effective stimulus. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved) |
