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Biological Adaptedness and Specialization of Instinctive Behaviour*

Abstract

INSTINCTIVE behaviour is to be regarded, from the biological point of view, as one of the means through which the animal fulfils the biological ends of development, maintenance and reproduction. Now as each species of animal fulfils these ends in a particular way, being after its kind a functional and ecological specialist, we may expect to find that its instinctive equipment, its predisposition to particular perceptions and actions, is also specialized and adapted to its functional requirements, and to the particular environmental complex in which the species normally lives, at different stages of its existence.

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RUSSELL, E. Biological Adaptedness and Specialization of Instinctive Behaviour*. Nature 147, 729–734 (1941). https://doi.org/10.1038/147729a0

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