The Study of Instinct
E711533
The Study of Instinct is a landmark 1951 book by ethologist Niko Tinbergen that systematically analyzes animal instinctive behavior and helped establish the foundations of modern ethology.
All labels observed (1)
| Label | Occurrences |
|---|---|
| The Study of Instinct canonical | 2 |
How this entity was disambiguated
This entity first appeared as the object of triple T8102091 — resolving that mention is where its identity was fixed. The disambiguator weighed these candidate entities and picked the highlighted one (or “None”, minting a new entity). This is how homonymy is resolved: the same surface form can point to different entities.
NED1
Entity disambiguation (via context triple)
gpt-5-mini-2025-08-07
Target entity: The Study of Instinct Context triple: [Niko Tinbergen, notableWork, The Study of Instinct]
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A.
Lectures on Human and Animal Psychology
Lectures on Human and Animal Psychology is a foundational psychological work by Wilhelm Wundt that explores the comparative study of mental processes in humans and animals.
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B.
Animal Intelligence: An Experimental Study of the Associative Processes in Animals
"Animal Intelligence: An Experimental Study of the Associative Processes in Animals" is Edward L. Thorndike’s landmark early work in comparative psychology that introduced experimental methods to study learning and problem-solving in animals.
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C.
The Principles of Psychology
The Principles of Psychology is an influential 1890 book by William James that helped establish psychology as a scientific discipline and introduced key ideas such as the stream of consciousness and functionalism.
-
D.
The Principles of Psychology
The Principles of Psychology is an influential 19th-century work by Herbert Spencer that applies evolutionary theory to explain mental processes and the development of the mind.
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E.
Zoonomia; or, The Laws of Organic Life
Zoonomia; or, The Laws of Organic Life is an influential late-18th-century medical and biological treatise by Erasmus Darwin that proposed early ideas about evolution, physiology, and the organization of living beings.
- F. None of above. chosen
- G. Unsure - the case is ambiguous/there is not enough information to decide.
NED2
Entity disambiguation (via description)
gpt-5-mini-2025-08-07
Target entity: The Study of Instinct Target entity description: The Study of Instinct is a landmark 1951 book by ethologist Niko Tinbergen that systematically analyzes animal instinctive behavior and helped establish the foundations of modern ethology.
-
A.
Lectures on Human and Animal Psychology
Lectures on Human and Animal Psychology is a foundational psychological work by Wilhelm Wundt that explores the comparative study of mental processes in humans and animals.
-
B.
Animal Intelligence: An Experimental Study of the Associative Processes in Animals
"Animal Intelligence: An Experimental Study of the Associative Processes in Animals" is Edward L. Thorndike’s landmark early work in comparative psychology that introduced experimental methods to study learning and problem-solving in animals.
-
C.
The Principles of Psychology
The Principles of Psychology is an influential 1890 book by William James that helped establish psychology as a scientific discipline and introduced key ideas such as the stream of consciousness and functionalism.
-
D.
The Principles of Psychology
The Principles of Psychology is an influential 19th-century work by Herbert Spencer that applies evolutionary theory to explain mental processes and the development of the mind.
-
E.
Zoonomia; or, The Laws of Organic Life
Zoonomia; or, The Laws of Organic Life is an influential late-18th-century medical and biological treatise by Erasmus Darwin that proposed early ideas about evolution, physiology, and the organization of living beings.
- F. None of above. chosen
Statements (44)
| Predicate | Object |
|---|---|
| instanceOf |
book
ⓘ
scientific monograph ⓘ |
| academicAudience |
behavioral scientists
ⓘ
biologists ⓘ psychologists ⓘ zoologists ⓘ |
| author | Niko Tinbergen ⓘ |
| countryOfOrigin | United Kingdom ⓘ |
| describedBySource | landmark work in ethology ⓘ |
| fieldOfStudy |
behavioral biology
ⓘ
biology ⓘ zoology ⓘ |
| genre |
animal behavior
ⓘ
ethology ⓘ |
| hasAuthorAcademicDiscipline |
ethology
ⓘ
zoology ⓘ |
| hasImpact |
shaped conceptual framework of instinct in biology
ⓘ
standard reference in ethology education ⓘ |
| hasInfluencedDiscipline |
animal cognition studies
ⓘ
behavioral ecology ⓘ comparative psychology ⓘ |
| hasInfluencedPerson |
Karl von Frisch
ⓘ
Konrad Lorenz ⓘ subsequent generations of ethologists ⓘ |
| hasKeyConcept |
causation of behavior
ⓘ
evolution of behavior ⓘ fixed action pattern ⓘ function of behavior ⓘ hierarchical organization of behavior ⓘ innate behavior ⓘ interaction of innate and learned behavior ⓘ motivation in animal behavior ⓘ ontogeny of behavior ⓘ releaser (sign stimulus) ⓘ |
| influenced |
modern ethology
ⓘ
study of animal behavior ⓘ |
| language | English ⓘ |
| mainTopic |
animal behavior
ⓘ
ethology ⓘ instinct ⓘ |
| notableFor |
helping establish foundations of modern ethology
ⓘ
systematic analysis of instinctive behavior ⓘ |
| publicationYear | 1951 ⓘ |
| timePeriodDescribed | mid-20th century ethology ⓘ |
How these facts were elicited
The pipeline generated the facts above by prompting gpt-5.1 with this entity's name + description and the instruction below.
Instruction
You are a knowledge base construction expert. Given a subject entity and a description of it, return factual statements that you know for the subject as a JSON list of dictionaries(triples), where keys must be "subject", "predicate" and "object". The number of facts may be very high, between 25 to 50 or more, for very popular subjects. For less popular subjects, the number of facts can be very low, like 5 or 10. # Requirements - If you don't know the subject at all, return an empty list. - If the subject is not a named entity, return an empty list. - Include at least one triple where predicate is "instanceOf". - Do not get too wordy. - Separate several objects into multiple triples with one object.
Input
Subject: The Study of Instinct Description of subject: The Study of Instinct is a landmark 1951 book by ethologist Niko Tinbergen that systematically analyzes animal instinctive behavior and helped establish the foundations of modern ethology.
Referenced by (2)
Full triples — surface form annotated when it differs from this entity's canonical label.