Introduction:According to the theory of ethology, separation of infants from their mothers immediately after birth can interfere with the infants’ innate breastfeeding behaviours. The aim of this study was to assess the effect of an interventional program, based on the theory of ethology, on infants’ breastfeeding competence. Methods:In total, 114 primiparous, healthy, full-term mothers (withi...

1. A century of evolutionary psychology The evolution of mind and behavior was of intense interest to Charles Darwin throughout his life. His views were made public a decade before his death in The Descent of Man (e.g. 1981 [1871]) and The Expression of the Emotions in Man and Animals (1965 [1872]). Evolutionary psychology has been an active field of research and a topic of public controversy f...

Self-organization was introduced originally in the context of physics and chemistry to describe how microscopic processes give rise to macroscopic stuctures in out-of-equilibrium systems, Recent research that extends this concept to ethology suggests that it provides a concise description of a wide range of collective phenomena in animals, especially in social insects. This description does not...

This paper builds bridges between robotics, psychology and ethology in order to define a kind of ”Turing test” that would constitute a possible aim for entertainment robotics. We argue that the design principles responsible for the success of existing artificial pet are not sufficient for building robots capable of a rewarding relationship with their owner. To achieve this goal, robots must dis...

Studies of attention, often conducted in artificial laboratory experiments, may have limited validity when performance in the natural world is considered. For instance, for over two decades investigations of "reflexive" and "volitional" attention have tended to be grounded in methodologies that do not capture the demands of attention in everyday life. Recent studies suggest these laboratory inv...