considerable literature on plant communities and animal societies, and the sociology of plants and animals. Some of the significance from a sociological standpoint of the comparative study of plants, lower organisms, and higher organisms, including man, has been brought out in Park and Burgess (chap. iii and Bibliography). Apparently we have here the beginning of a comparative sociology.

The theoretical possibility of the extension of social psychology to include the responses of other organisms has been indicated by Thomas and Znaniecki in The Polish Peasant (Vol. I, Meth. note). Allport, in his recent text, Social Psychology, rejects the definition of social which limits it to human behavior and "conscious" behavior (p. 12). He extends the field to include all forms of animal life in which we find reactions of individuals to one another. The enhanced scientific worth and enriched study resulting from the treatment of social behavior in the broader sense is clearly evident in his book. Gault also assumes social reactions in animals.

The foregoing brief statement should indicate a basis in present social studies for data broader than anthropological processes. The second task is to consider the possible validity of such a conception, and some of the factors involved in such a view.

In the past we have been almost hopelessly anthropocentric. Man has considered himself the center of the universe. He has been pleased to think himself unique-a thing apart-a special creation. I suppose this tendency for man to be concerned with himself and his problems is a natural one. Sciences have developed around these problems of human life. Thus sociology has developed. And it has developed primarily as a study of human society. But just as we have discovered that man is not unique and not a special creation, that he is after all an evolutionary creation or product, along with the other animals and organisms, so we are learning that other animals are social and have a social life—it seems almost superfluous to say it—and that we may add much to our knowledge by study of them as such social beings.

But the more specific problem is: What is the basis for limiting the notion "social" to the influences of human beings upon each other? Space will not permit a discussion of all the various concep

tions about the differences between man and the other animals, or of all the particular theories limiting the social to human interaction. The only conception which I wish to consider here is one which appears to be most valid if we are to make such a distinction.

The outstanding basis for limiting the social to human relations is psychological. A considerable number of sociologists limit social data to conscious interaction. Social phenomena are often defined as psychic interstimulation. This leaves us on a similar basis. When pressed for a definition of "psychic" it generally turns out to mean "mind," "mental," "consciousness," etc. Or if, as is more rare, psychical is used in a broad sense, somewhat synonymous with psychological, it extends far into the infra-human field. The problem immediately arises as to what is meant by conscious. Conscious and consciousness may be used in two ways: first, as a general term, including in addition to reflective (thought) responses, unreflective response, tropisms as well as responses of the distance receptors; second, in a restricted sense referring particularly to reflective responses. If we apply the first meaning to conscious activity, it is not limited to human beings. Other organisms respond in this manner. Obviously, if sociology and social psychology study such interstimulation their field extends over a large range of different types of organisms.

Used in the second sense, conscious behavior does seemingly furnish a distinction between man and the other animals. Man, so far as we have been able to discover, is the only animal that has been able to develop reflective behavior. He represents in this respect a much more complex psychological integration and co-ordination. By reflective behavior is meant what is ordinarily called "thinking" in the sense of conceptual thought. In general, it is the broad category known as language habits. Human beings have built up in this manner a large significant environment by which they represent to themselves absent objects and indicate to themselves the meaning of their activity. Thus society, while not physically present, is psychologically present in the form of these signs, symbols, words, gestures, etc., which are used as substitutes for the absent parts. Hence society might be said to exist in this common

product of communication and thought, which is meaningless to an organism without society, but becomes freighted with significance when associated with others. It is through, and in, this kind of interstimulation that man becomes a person-that man becomes human. Here the concepts of the self and of others, which seem to be at the basis of reflective behavior, become realities. It has been said that society consists more of such a consensus than of anything else. I suppose this is the social par excellence. It is a beautiful theory and very satisfying except that it does not appear to fit the facts when it places its peculiar limit on the "social."

Now the question arises: Is there a scientific basis for limiting the social to this category? The answer appears to be in the negative. The first difficulty is to determine just how much and what part of collective behavior is of this reflective type. What is to be done with all the acts of human beings that were once thoughtfully performed, but have become habitual, unconscious, and unthinking? These are very powerful influences in human behavior. If these are to be considered non-social, when do they become so, how much and how little in them is social? At the extreme on this basis we should have a large number of acts jumping back and forth from social to non-social, as this intangible thing, consciousness, fluctuates. If these are to be called social, then we begin to put a strain on our criterion of consciousness as a basis for the social. It might be said that they are social on account of their origin. This appears to be the best statement for the case, but it is hardly satisfactory. Besides this, however, the larger problem of determining what activity is conscious or unconscious seems to be one which we cannot solve with sufficient accuracy to make it an a priori limit upon the social.

Another difficulty is that human beings are unaware of a large number of very potent influences which are exerted upon them by other human beings who are also unaware of these influences. If the study of these is to be excluded from sociological investigation, then we restrict very materially our knowledge of social processes and collective behavior. Fortunately, in practice, this type of data is admitted, to some extent, although with violence to verbal defini

tions. For example, in a recent text which, by the way, is probably the best text which has appeared in sociology, despite some curious inconsistencies, we find the conception that one of the four major social processes, the economic process in its pure competitive form, is interaction without social contact; the idea being that these powerful economic interactions between persons are not social until they become "conscious" or develop "meaning." Obviously, this is a social process in its pure form, and we have therein social contact, which is a "free competitive" and unconscious type of contact. In addition, it might be well to point out that apparently a considerable number of people merely live a vegetative existence. Then again our psychologists are disclosing to us the irrational man. Persons are motivated by powerful drives and habits of which they are unaware. Man's meager set of language and thought reactions may not play such a major rôle in collective behavior as has sometimes been supposed.

A further problem regards the kind of difference which exists between man and other organisms. If we attempt to use subjective criteria, such as a subjective consciousness for example, to explain this difference, we find that our scientific technique is not equipped to handle successfully this subjective evidence, unless it is objectively expressed in some manner. Furthermore, consciousness is not an explanation, but merely a short-hand description which we apply to organisms (or posit in them) when they act in a certain manner. In order to explain the differences, we must go back to the actual behavior of organisms, the responses, and the operation of the response mechanisms. The most satisfactory scientific explanation of consciousness appears to be such a behavioristic explanation. As a matter of fact, our empirical, everyday method of determining whether a person is "conscious" or "unconscious" is this type of behavior, i.e., communication or verbal reactions. From this objective basis, all organisms might be said to be conscious in the sense that they respond or "pay attention" to stimuli. For example, heliotropic insects or chemotropic infusoria may be called conscious in this sense. But there are differences in the type of response. Now the principal objective difference between man

and other animals which we find in the type of response is that which is given in delayed reactions which are initiated by substitute stimuli for absent objects the process which we ordinarily call language habits and communication.2

Now the experimental data of the psychologists furnish more and more evidence that these differences between organisms, between man and other animals, are differences of degree rather than of kind. Of course, we cannot be dogmatic here. But man's behavior appears to be of the same kind as that of other organisms if we allow for differences in its co-ordination, integration, and development. Other organisms apparently operate, in this respect, on the same principles as man. Language reactions are merely one type of behavior. But in addition to this, we cannot say dogmatically that other animals cannot develop language habits and thought. Neither can we say that they do not think, although, if they do, it may be other than conceptual thought which occurs. Other animals may have to a limited degree developed self-consciousness. We certainly cannot deny them consciousness, interpreting the term broadly.

These differences are apparently too indefinite, insecure, and vague to be used as a basis for such a fundamental distinction as has been assumed in limiting the social to human animals. It is legitimate to study intensively human behavior as such, but it should be recognized that this is only a part of similar data to be found in the behavior of other organisms.

Further, admitting that this distinction is valid, that man is the only animal which is human with society as a consensus, with a significant or conceptual environment, is this a valid basis for the limitation of the social? A consideration of the facts does not seem to point toward such a limitation. Man apparently has become human by virtue of the fact that he was a social animal. It has been on account of the social co-operation among animals that they have evolved the interchangeability of receptor-effector mechanisms

2

'A more complete statement of this appears in an article by the writer, "The Place of Language Habits in a Behavioristic Explanation of Consciousness," Psychological Review, September, 1925.