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GOGNITTVE MAPS IN RATS AND MENtlI

# Edward C. Tolman (1948)
w
.ffi
Fi$t publish ed, n The P sycho lo gic al Review, 55 (4), 1
g
9-20 g.
*-
orexperimgnts y-ith rats. But r shau atso anempt in a few words
l.'lflt"?:::::111,T9l-|l!1tif:l 1j;scnnjon
lg of
at the close to indicate the signi-hiance thesafindings on rats for the rriri""rGL""i;;;;;".;:'MTJ
investigations, which I shall repllrt, were carried out in the Berkeley taUorutory.
otttre rut
nut I shall also include, occasionally,
accounts of the behavior of non'Berkeley ratq who o_bviously have *irrp.ot
trr*i, liu", in out-of-State laboratories.
Furtherurore, in reporting our Berkeley experiments I shall have to omif a very great
many. The ones I shalltalk about
were carried out by graduate shidene (or underpaid research assistants) *ho
*yr.lf, '
;rop"sedly,
rI ' got some of their ideas from
me. And a few, though a very Gw, were even canied out by m"
:fr
Let m.e begin by presenting dia&arns for a couple. of typical mazes, an alley maze and
an elevated maze.ln the typical
experiment a hungry_rat is the entranci maze (alley orelelatei;, and wanders about *noush the various
true path segments ry1,?* "lf"
atl"uersgrlit he finally comes tb ttre food box and eats. This is t.p"ut"Jiduio
typical experiment) ry Ti* and the animal tends to make fewer und f"*", effors (that is,
in the
"::^91_",",?Y_?1h",*t blind-alley
entrances) and to take less and [ess time betweel start and goal-box until finally he is entering
no ifina, at all and
running in a very few secondt fro* start to goal. The r.rult-, are usually presented,in
J r - - - ---- - the fonn of average curves of
blind-entranses, or of seconds ftom start to ilrish, ror grcups
e- - --F- of rats.
,#
All students agree as to the Acti. ttrey disagrce, however, on theory and explanation.
&
(1) First, there is a school of animal psychologists which believes that the maze behavior
of rats is a matter of mere
simple stimulus-response conndptions. Learning, according to them, consists in the sffengthening
of some of these
connections and in the weakenlirg g,of others. According to this stimulus -response' schoolthe ruiin progr"rrioj Ao*o
the maze is helplessly respondid of external stimuli-sights, sounds, smells, pressuris, .t". inriioging
.qq.9,1:".3s1ion
upon his external sense organs:|lus
plus internal stimuli coming
comine from the viscera and from
frnrn the afala+ol a,,calo.
fhe slieletar muscles. rir-^J
Tit".!
external and internal stimuli cal oy11he walkings, runnings, turnings, retracings, smellings,
!f rearings, and the like
which appear. The rafs central nervous system, according to iltir view; may be ff,ened to -a complicated
r^l^-L^-^ -F.1901
telephone switchboard.
^-.:r-LL^^-

There are the incoming calls from sense-organs and

there are the outgoing messages to muscles. Before
the learning of a specific maze, the connecting
switches (synapses according to the physiologist)
are ciosed in one set of ways and produce thJ
primarily exploratory responses which appear in the
early trials. Lemning, according to this vilw,
consists in the respective stengthening and
weakening of various of these connections;those
connections which result in the anirnal's going down
 !
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i
.$

*
#
E
the true path become refatively mtre opsrl to the
passage of nervous imprilses, whereas thgse which
lead him into the blinds,become rclativcly less open.
_,,

It must be noted in addiiion, however, that this

stimulus-response schodl divides further into two
subgroups. #
s
(a) There is a subgroup;fohich holds that the mere
Ji,
mechanics involved in the running of a maze is such
that the crucial stimuli from the maze g# presented
simultaneously with the+ibonect responsffi more
frequently than they do fuith any of the incorrect
Flrn oI raelg
l*-Ilrdt T-AIlcy tr[r4 responses. Hence, just dn a basis of this greater
frequency, the neural cohnections between the
ju*r*
. {Frue !tof lrt!.
fotrrrrt
E, slrg;, mo ,ro,fll' qf. tesnd {tr tbs raqzE pe1.
ttnt+. 96g17. figf,I. Plyth'/.., lft!, *,
crucial stimuli and the cbrrect responses will tend, it
D, UO,) is said, to [p.191] get strengthened at the expense of
the incorrect connectionS.
;g
(b) There is a second subgroup in this stimulus-response school which holds that the reasofi the appropriate
oonnections get shengthened relatively to the inappropriate ones is, rather, the fact that thelesponsls resulting from the
correct connections are followed more closely in time by need-reductions. Thus a hungry rirt in a maze tends-to get to
flood and have his hunger reduced sooner as a result of the true path responses than asireiult of the blind alley
responses. And such immediately following need-reductiorls or, to use another term, such
$ositive reinforcemints'
lend somehow, it is said, to shengthen the connections which have most closely preceded tfoem. Thus it is as if-
llthough this is certainly not the way this subgroup would themselves state it-tfii satisfacti$n-receiving part of the rat
lelephoned back to Cenhal and said to the girl: "Hold that connection; it was good; and sed'to it that you Utantcety-
blank well use it again the next time these same stimuli come in." -
+
These thEorists also assume (at least
some of ihem do some of the lqllgzJ
..: that if bad results-
fime)
annoyanbes,"negative
reinforcdnents'- follow, then this
same satibfaction- and annoyance-
receivin$part of the rat will
telephond back and say, "Break that
connecti6n and don't you dare use it
next tim&either."
g
So muchl.for a brief summary of the
two subf,arieties of the'stimulus-
or telephone switchboard

2
 r
'4
+

*
+

school.

(2) Let us turn now to the second

main school. This group (and I
belong to them) may be called the
field theorists. We believe that in the
course of leaming something like a
field map of the environment gets
established in the rat's brain. We
agree with the other school that the
rdt in running a maze is exposed to
l+-thit t-Etarsltd stirnuli and is finally led as a result
* of these stimuli to the responses
* fter which aotually occur. Wafeel,
if:l ,f;t"i,1:f'"ftLff:y.m-."*nmg;1T*
l93dt 13, No. itr F, 4. The*
'
tErE rrs rsEEuEEr
us* *rrc-rso ;"r* Frfited
tdcntisal o'flr*! #Tfl;*itfffr
Dt $ilt in",-r*'
il; b;!ij.-'
;ffiil s'f,i
nqFc57' however,
tbt s{Er rva' }
nowever, tnatthe
thatthe interveningbrain
tntervening bri
procgsses are morg complicated,
:,' .
' .l more patterned anr{ n#.-
naffer'ned and often,
:ragmatically speaking, more autonomous than do the stimulus-response pqychologists. Although *" ud*it that the rat
is bombarded by stimuli, we hold that his nervous system is surprisingly sellctive is to
which of these stimuli it will let
.n at any given time.

iecondly, we assert that the central office itself is far

nore like a map control room than it is like an old-
lshioned telephone exchange. The stimuli, which are
rllowed in, are not connected byijust simple one-to-
lne switches to the outgoing responsos. Rather, the
ncoming impulses are usually worked over and
:laborated in the central contol room into a tentative,
:ognitive-like map of the environment. And it is this
entative'map, indicating routes and paths and
:nvironmental relationships, which: finally determines
vhat responses, if any, the animal will finally release.
p. i 931

linally, I, personally, would hold further that it is also

mportant to discover in how far these maps are
'elatively narrow and strip,like or ielatively broad and
:omprehensive. Both strip-maps and comprehensive-
naps may be either correct or incorrect in the sense
 i.

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rl}+fB7

that they may (or may not), when acted upon, lead rlo s '.

successfuliy to the animal's goal. The differences {Ftroln E. C, Toluen end C. E Eortd!* De*+E_sl hsEtrr, remrd. snd noq,.
berween such strip maps anJsuch comprehensive
maps will appear only when the rat is later presented
f#illfu*'ffiffifu*#f*fijl;,.*tf;|trffi
e
f*Hi
with some change within the given environment. Then, the narrower and more strip-like fl{e original map, the less will
it carry over successfully to the new problem; whereas, the wider and the more comprehedsive it was, the more
adequately it will serve in the new set-up. In a strip-map the given position of the animal is connected by only a
relatively simple and single path to the position of the goal. In a comprehensive.map a wiber arc of the Lnvironment is
represented, so that, if the starting position of the animal be changed or variations in the
$ecific routes be intoduced,
this wider map wiil allow the animal still to behave relatively correctly and to choose the jlnnronriate new route.
f-l '.F
But let us turn, now, to the actual experiments. The ones,
out of many, which I have selected to report are simply
ones which seem especially important in reinbrcing the
tbeoretical position I have bden prrsenting- This poiition,
I repeat, contains two assumltions: First, that learning
consists not in stimulus-resppnse connections but in tlre
building up in the nervous sfstem of sets which function
like cognitive maps, and sec6nd, that such cognitive maps
may be usefully characterize"d as varying from a narrow
ship variety to a broader comprehensive variety.

The experiments fall under five heads: (i) "latent

I I II learning," (2) "vicarious trailland
trail,and error" or "VTE," (3)
LJ Ll stimulur,"il4; "hypotheses" and (ij
"search'lng'for the stimulur,"$14;
"searching'for
6-urir Arrav T-Mare "spatial orientation."[p.194] E
F$. {
{Froa Il,
C. Etrdgru, Thc rftrt ol $c iatrqducrimr et tlrsrd u!,od, (T) "Latent Learning" t*p")i*"nu. The first of the latent
ib. otT pcrfotl'r:r+-ot'rat*- V*r'rr, 66Jr/. P;lt, rr$or" rgl-g, +,-tli t, learning experimenti wai peifomed at Berkeley by
p. rrl.)
Blodgett. It was published irt. D29. Blodgett not only
performed the experiments, he also originated the concept. He ran lhre" groupi of rats thrdugh a six-uiit alley maze,
shown in Fig. 4. He had a control group and two experimental groups. The error curyes fo'l these $oups appear iri Fig.
5. The solid line shows the error curve for Group I, the control group. These animals were run in orthodoi iashion.
That is, they were run one trial a day and found food in the goal-box at the end of each trial. Groups II and III were
the experimental groups. i
*
E,

s
4
r
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e
'he animals of Group II, the dash line,
six II o.ar.t I
*er*i ir
rere not fed in the maze for the first
.r-! i ! t ---S----- !.DL -.',1.--,.. lfrq|
.',1.--t..Grultt
II
Ctlr' fr|
ays but only in their home cagei some
vo hours later. On the seventh dgy
il:[:ffili,i1!"",1*i;,iii:!fu
ound food at the endof.lilTF}. *"
irst time and continued to find iton
.",.,[ II \
\'\{r*_,
i
.*-
,r-.
ubsequent days. The animals oflGroup r.of
II were treated similarly exceptthat they
" I
irst found food at the end of tnefmaz"
,n the third day and continued to findit I'ttI
here on subsequent days. It willibe I
rbserved that the experimental gXoups as _ I
ong as they were not fiodiog d$a aio , t'o[
rot appear to learn much. (Theirjenor i I
;urves did not drop.) But onthe'idays I o,rl
rnmediately succeeding their fir-st i I
inding of the food their enor crirves did I I
trop asgundingly. It appeared,. rlon, aI
rrai auring the non-rewarded tiiils these
o ,r. L I r I
-,
'nimals hud be"n learning mu"{mot"
Frrt- 5
han they had exhibited. This lelrning, - (F!om H. C.'Elods+r, Thr cEect oI the idtrodlitryR_tf n$*rd, upou rlc lriuc per-
vhich did not manifest itself unfrl aftir fqnuante of r*ts" Vrrfu. Cdfi/..3*bl. P.ryalot, 192*, 4, Iilo. 8, p. 120.!
he food had been introduced, B""lodgett called "latent learning." Interpreting these results anthropomorphically, we
vould say that as long as the animals were not getting any food at the end of ths maze they oontinued'to take theii
p:,195] time in going through rt-g.hey continued to enter many blinds. Once, however, they knew they were to get food,
heydemonstated that during these preceding non-rewarded trials they had leamed where many of the blinds were.
[hey-had. been building up a 'm?F,' and could utilize the litter as soon as they were motivated to do so.
a
{onzik and myself repeated thejexperiments (or rather he did and I got some of the credit) with the 14-unit T-mazes
rhown in Fig.l, and with largerigroups of animals, and got simiiar results. The resulting curves are shown in Fig.6. We
rsed two control groups-one th{t never found food in the maze (HNR) and one that found itthrougbout (HR). The
:xperimental group (HNR-R) ftiJnd food at the end of the maze from the llth day on and showed the same sort.of a
;udden drop. But probably the Qest experiment demonstrating latent learning was, unfortunately, done not in Berkeley
rut at the University of Iowa, by Spence and Lippitt. Only an abstract of this experiment has as yet been published.
{owever, Spence has sent a preliminary manuscript from which the following account is summarized.

A simple Y-maze (see Fig.7)

.with trvo goal-boxes was used.
Water was at the end of the
right arm of the Y and food at
the end of the left ann. During
the taining period fhe rats
were nm neither hungry nor
thirsty. They were satiated for
both food and water before
each day's trials. However, they
were willing to run because
after each run they were taken
out of whichever end box they
had got to and put into a living
cage, witl other animals in it.
They were given four hials a
 rii!
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X
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D' *a
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day.in this fashion [p.196] for
seven days, two trials to the
riglit and two to the left.
,F
In the crucial test the animals
Errar cflryH foi EIR, EIIrlR, lnfl ISIB-I. wefe divided into two

(Frorn E. c- Tornan rrd c. rr. non*r,, rffulor* srd ,.nov'r ar rtward, rnd n,'E
Cd{. Pabl. Ptyt*oL, 1930, ,1, No, 19, p. t6?,)
*'- itffi"ffo"H*:1|;Til*.
formence ir tats. trftriu- t;#?*e
"r*.
went at once to the left, where the food had been, statistically more frequently
i

"tir"**
than t" tlt;iight; th" thir"fy g*p
went to the right where the water had been" statistically more frequently than to the left. These results indicabd ftat
under the previous non-differential and very mild rewarding conditions of merely being returnod to the hsme cages the
animals had nevertheless been leaming where the water was and where the food was. In shor[ they had acquird a
cognitive map to the effect that food was to the left and wa*er to the right although during the acguisitibn ofthis map
they had not exhibited any stimulus-response propensities to go more {o the side wnicn biqane bter the slle of &e
appropriate goal. *
, .
Therehavebeennumerousotherlatentlearningexperimentsdoneinthe
Berkeley laboratory and elsewhere. In general, they have for the most part
all confirmed the above sort of findings. i
Let us turn now to the second gro'Jp
of experiments.
i
(2) "Yicarious Trial and Error" or
uWE."The term Vicarious Trial
and Error (abbreviated as VTE) was
invented by Prof. Muenzinger at
Colorado[Z] to designate the
hesitating, look-[p. 197] king-back-
and-forth, sort of behavior which *
rats can often be observed to ti
indulge in at a choice-point before '.."

actually going one way or the other.

Quite a number of experiments

6
 Graund phn of the lpperefu*
upon VTEing have been carried out f,'rc. t
in our laboratory.I shall report only . (Trltr_ fran X, l|/, $penos rrd B, Lipoitt-
An erperinentat ttst of tt*.iei_Eoiiiiri#;
a few. ln most of them whit is
called a discrimination set-up has {.S4_*t cror tmrnins. J.
lBlr6r 36, p, 194. In this-*rticta"F;.
irf;;:.
ti,;; ;'.ft;:
plerrrs Usld tor Testing D&nrininitiou af been used. In one characteristic lfr*g rnotbcr *perimmr [,r41,s# d;;;
urre.)
V!*nl ktrnrnl type of visual discrimination
E
trte,B + apparatus designed by Lashly (shown in Fig.g)
the animal is put on a jumping
(f,rou K. *. *itt, ,tt. -**.*ir* o1 stand and faced with two doors which
visiorn L A ruthod lirr rlnfra diffe;.in ,o*",ir"ui-piop"nv say, as.
in rtr reL -"t)*$ .I here shown, vertical stripes vs. horizontal shipes.
t1!1r"1-Jorou
ISO, 3?, p. 45+-l
f.'4itt. irti+d,
one of each_such pair of visual stimuli is made always
correct and the other
Y#[g;,T3'1,*fl""::"1fl::3gi^Tljl1"".:if,i:_'**T *n'?"-:t*ffiffiffiffiHHffi#:;H?"
[fffi]Y-'*t iH:i:i]"r: jyt: *:::t:1,::Jli1j:111i1 pi,{"t:r' ft"ilJ;il ['ffil'ii'; ff:i'H;
he"nnds tn" 1:t+1i'
ot"ir""r"dffi 6i, ffi;
l**#""*,t:*::l:lld
flrom whioh he is picked up and. starteA T::T""tly,
over again. "Ei::;JH:H,?fjil';
Jsing a similar set-up (r"" fig.ig),
rut with landing platforms in.fr6nt of
he doors so that if the rat chosd
ncorrectly he could jump backlgain
rnd start over, I found that when the
,hoic.e was an easy one, say befreen
r white door and a black door. ihe
urimals not only learned soonerlbut
rlso did more VTEing than wheir the
:hoice was difficult, say befivedn a
vhite door and a gray door (sed
rig.10). It appeared further (see.i
rig.l l) that the VTEing began qo
Lppearjust as (orjust before) thi rats
regan to learn. After the leamin! had
)ecome established, however, the
/TE's began to go down. Furthrjr, in
r study of individual dif-[p.l98J
'&

s4-.
t-fi
is
tf
*
 ,l

ferences by myself, Geier and

Levin[3] (actually done by Geier and Fs,I
Levin) using this same visual (rt|t x' c. fotual Pt+dictioo il rdrqrlaus t$rl ard Hror hy slrru of tlc nsruetir r$f,-
:tug' Farcuot.
discriminatiOn apparafuso it was Rtv., lT39' *i' p. $19.)
found that with one and the same difticulty of problem the smarter animal did
the more VTEing.

^"-h;f ll'l?'ili11f:*",* ro ,ut up, in visuat

crimination experiments the
dis
better the learning the more &e
VTE's. But this seems contrary to
what we would perhaps have
expected. We oursetves would
,-.---\.*
i-
expectto domoreVTEing more
nEotrrHrEFEY SamPrmg
,nl- i A'rr.
H-lo r\*\*- s"mplihg or two *imuti,
-'-i
of the
Ine Two mmu wnen
$rI H_ J ,'
t' -r---r,,
it is difficult to choose betwben
bel
=I them than when it is easy.
_l *..A.r-.d-rl--\**
ib er# -_t'..-._
--]-:f-*}'---'-'-'.,. .i,Jr- i
:ll*.---"- - what ii fhe explanation? The
6
u It J "J \-...r-n' o *.
Lr6xT GrEr answe{lies, I believe, in the fact
that th6 manner in which we set
the vistial discrimination problems
for thefrats and the mannir in
whichfive set similar problems for
ourselfes are different: We aheady
haur ofir 'instructions.'We know
beforefrand what it is we are to do.
We ardtold, or we tell ourselves,
a*?3 that it i3 the lighter of the two

JFr,oa. E. c. Tqr*ss, F&dirrroo

-nurl ",
lsrcgca- nr"., ibss, q4 p. 3tsJ
**r*;:, q'd ..ror by:b6rnr sr thr $hcrarijc sow. tr3ttffilffJ',?lrl1,ll?.TrX r, o"
. chosen'i3ln such a setting we do
when the stimulus-diffeience is small. But for the rats the usual problem in u aisrri#,la[ffHi..:i#?:1}ff*n
lifferent' They do not know what is wanted of them, The major putt of their r.u*i"j-il;drt
:o consist in their dis-[p.199] covering the instructions" The .ltr
il;i ""periments seems
huu" to discover that it is the differences in visual
 '
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$
.$
brightness, not the difrbrences b*btween left and right, which they are to pay atteirtion to. Their VTEing appears when
they begin to lcatch on.' The grdater the difference between the two stimuf tne more the animals *" uitr*i"d by this
difference. Hence the sooner they catch on, and during this catching on" the more they VTE.
:{
g AlfER.trGE I.IO. OF YTETS
That this is a reasonable- $,_ FER D^y
interpretation appeared further, :from
an experimentby rnyself and Minium ,+
(the actual workdone, of coursi, by ,J
Minium) in which a group of six rats ;"1
was first taught a white vs. black , ..'[
ttf n
discriminatiJn, then two succesiively I
more difficult gray vs. black $ :1 {*
discriminations. f'br each difficulty t"h
_
1,f
tt
the rats were given a long series of ,'f Il
further trials beyond the points at , I!
which mey
wnrch they nad + r--\r
Comparing 'n+ol
had learned. L:ompanng F
E t r--\t *
l: l: '--r l*
the beginning of each of these three - *[ ,/-]* Ii \ ,t
difficulties the results were thatthe rf ' \ .,,V
rats did more VTEing for the easy .l- II \,y' u.o*fo*r,
discriminations than for the more / ,L ,i-.
difEcult ono. wn"Jto;#,d T "--*...,. ro .,'*..*
;;;;;;d;;r
came to a comparison of amounts of
"f "*",i"t' "r,L r'.-3.rr1. ;i'-.."n'\1..r'r'
:t '*"'*. -i' '..^__. ! t.,_ i'
VTEing d".i"d the final performanc. f ,/
after
-rL- each
--^L l^--:--
leaming t--r
had reached
----1--l a
- 'rr
af \.

plateara the opposite rezults were

tY
obtarned. tn ottrer words; after the
rats had finally divined their g u*Ys ',

instructions, then they, like human Frc' lI

beings, did more VIEing, mord (rr1- E f,.
.bmfi' Ptuceol' Ttlmin, Ptcdbian cl dccriss* triat anil euor by nreils of tie xhemrib ro*-
Rrv" Is3e' {d p' i10'}
ru*ilittg, the more aimlurt trrej .
discrimination. $4
Finally, now let us note that is fras tp.200l also found at Berkeley by Jackson[A] that in a mazethe difficult maze units
produce, more VTEing and als{that the more stupid rats do the more VTEing. The explanation, as I see it, is tha! in
lhe case of mazes, rats know their instructions. For them it is natural to expect that the same spatial path will always
lead to the same outcome. *uU]ln mazes don't have to be told.
:tr

But wha! now, is the final sig{ficance of all this VTEing? How do these facts about VTEing affect our theoretical
argument? My answer is that these facts lend further support to the doctrine of a building up of maps. YTEing as I see
ig is evidence that in the critical stages-whether in the first picking up of the instructions or in the later making sure of
which stimulus is which-the ariimal's activity is not just one of responding passively to discrete stimuli, but rather one
of the active seleeting and comparing of stimuli. The brings me then to the third type of experiment.

(3) "Searchtnsfor the Stimulus." I

refer to a recent, and it seelns to me
extremely important experiment, done
for a Ph.D. dissertation by Hudson.
Hudson was fnst interested in the
question of whether or not rats could
leam an avoidance reaction in one
trial. His animals were tested one at a
time in a living cage (see Fig.13) with
a small striped visual pattern at the
end, on which was mounted a food
 i
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t*i t,
rt
ir
a
I ,1 itltt r {i I
fJI lt
It itll i
ir
t.

\i\.i t
il
ti lii
iit
i
.:
ffiro
t
I
I
tJ$ I ifrj"
I
'-r $rE.
\i
t t'tj"i"n*J'tr*,j'u
t
! cup. The hungry rat approached this
i food cup aha ge. An electrical
arrangement was provided so that
tiril.&ut tF06l ttlhBr-ui arfrtc*
FrrtE-s,*r a*.lt( GH+{LtfJ( when the fat touched the cup he could
q be given ffi electic shock. And one
such shock did appear to be enough.
F$. tt
this
(Froor s. c. Tolloen rnd E Minium, 1ff8 i{ rarr: or*leenring disnulty ot dbqrimin+-
ttuqr' J' rd'rf' P$isiel" le43' $l' p' il03')
end.
HJ|jlr*il3t"1:ffit#"Trin
immediately "#;il1hJ;;Jft"*onstrated
strong avoidance reactions to the visual pattern. The animal withdrew from thht end of tle [p.201] cage,
or piled up sawdust and covered the pattern, or showed various other amusing responses ali of which weie in the -
nature of withdrawing from the pattern or making it disappear -g

ff
But the parricular finding which I am interested in now appeared as a result of a modificadon of this standard .

procedure. Hudson noticed that the animals, anthropomorphically speaking, often seemed t6 look around afier he
shock to see what it was that had hit them. Hence it occurred to him that, if the pattern weib mde to disappear the
instant the shock occurred, the rats might not establish the association. And thii indeed is fihat Lappilnedin the case of
many individuals. Hudson added fu*her eleotrical connections so that when the shock was;*received during the eating,
the lights went out, the pattern and the food cup dropped out of sighl and the lights came 6n again an *Ann Ae
matter of a second. When zuch animals were again put in the cage 24 hours later, a large &"*tug" showed no
avoidance of the pattern. Orto quote Hudson's own words: l

"Learning what object to avoid...may occur exclusively during the period after theshock. For if the object from which
the shock was actually received is removed at the rnoment of the shoch a significant number of animals fail to learn to
avoid it, some selecting other features in the environment for avoidance, and others avoidirig nothing."
#
In other words, I feel that this experiment reinforces tli'e notion of the largely
. aotive selective character in the rat's building up of his'cognitive map. He often
has to look actively for the significant stimuli in orderjto form his map and does
not merely passively receive and react to all the stimrili which are physically
present.

Turn now to the fourth type of experiment.

$) The "Hypothesis" Experimerzfs. Both the notion of, in rats and the
Fft. IJ design of the experiments to demonstrate such are to be credited to
(Frtu Endford lludron. Fh!. Ttc*:
tOF! trbl haniry: rt r&dy of fis fftoid^Eltt
box the correct door at each choice-point may be deteimined by the experimenter
hhruitr ql t!. rat.' ft d.pddl ll t.b+ Li-
trarrr ol ttr Uaiqcdty frlilqmh
of Brtlt- in terms of its being lighted or dark,left or right, or vfirious combinations of
Iqr, Calitornia) these. If all lp.202l possibilities are randomized for thd 40 choiees made in 10 runs
of each day's test, the problem could be made insoluble.

,b-
#
:$
 F
*
F

E3
'3-

When this was done, Krech found ttrat the

individual rat went through a succession of
systematic choices. That is, the individual
t*_\riR"_lJ .,'* \\_Eg{
animal might perhaps begin by ohoosing
practically all right-handed doors, then he nA. l4
practically all {bypothwt b ntr- [lSu.
might give this up for choosing {8rsu,I. Xru*rtvlrf (Ncn, D, Erirl}' Tho pcuc*ir of
left-hand doors, and then, for choosing all fieliJ. Ptil. Pr1r*d., 19t?' t, No. *r n 16)
dark doors, and so on. These relatively persistent, and well-above-chance systematic types of ohoice Krech called
"hypotheses." In using this term he obviously did not mean to imply verbal processes in the rat but merely referred to
what I have been oalling cognitive maps which, it appears from his experiments, get set up in a tentative fashionto be

',r,
tried out first one and then another until, if possible, one is found which works.
.:{
ItI Finally, it is to be noted that these hypothesis experiments,
.;
"4 s:=
S, -., t |s
like the latent learning, VTE, and "looking for the stimulus"
-l experiments, do not, as such, throw light upon the widths of
the maps which are picked up but do indicate the
'generally man-fike and self-initiated character[p.203]
of learning.

= For the beginning of an attack upon the problem of the

width of the maps let me turn to the last group of
experiments.

(5) "Spatial Orientation'l Experimenfs. As early as 1929,

Lashley reported incidentally the case of a couple of his rats
who, after having learned an alley mazq pushed back the
cover near the starting box, climbed out and ran directly
auoss the top to the goal-box where they climbed down in
again and ate. Other investigators have reported related
findings. All such observations suggest that rats really
develop wider spatial maps which include more than the
mere trained-on specifig paths. In the experiments now to be
reported this possibility has been subjected to furttrer
examination

,In the first experimenf Tolman, Ritchie and Kalish (actualiy

Ritchie and Kalish) used the set-up shown in Fig.15.

Agprrtrr urd ltt ;rrlhinrrf urhiry

This was an eievated mazq The animals ran from A across
(Fm E c' Tolprq ,. fr;:u" gnd D. f,rrrrh, the open circular table through CD (which had alley walls)
$ltltiil tn
cardd tordo& L Orlrntdloo rld tfu &nrt-clrl ,1, arp. F,ry- and finally to G, the food box. H was a light which shone
r'ta[,, t916, 36, p. 16.]
directly down the path from G to F. After four nights, three
trials per night, in which the ra$ learned to run directly and without hesitation from A to G, the apparatus was changed
to the sun-burst shown in Fig.l The starting path and the table remained the same but a series of radiating paths was
added.

The animals were again starled at A [p.20a] and ran .

across the circular table into the alley and found

themselves blocked. They then returned onto the table
and began exploring practically all the radiating paths.
After going out a few inches only on any one path, each
rat finally chose to run all the way out on one. The
percentages of rats finally choosing each of the long paths

11
 I

from 1 to 12 ue shown in Fig.17. It

appears that there was
a preponderant tendency to choose path No.6 which ran
to a point some four inches in front of where the entance
to the food-box had been. The only other p*th chosen
with any appreciable frequency was No.1-that is, the path
which pointed perpendicularly t the food-side of the
room.

lpnrtl rnd in tt+ nrtgirl

Fra. tfi
{Flte t, C.lnlnru, B. F. IHtrtle *ud D. I(allrh, $tudlis In rpetirl
Lrtlbfi: L &Ldtriiru rld rhqqt-Nut. J. sslt. ftyrhl., 19{6, SEI
F.1?.)

These results seem to indicate that the rats in this experiment had learned
not only to run rapidly down the original roundabout route but also, when
this was blocked and radiating paths presented, to select one pointing
rather directly towards the point where the food had been or else at least
to select a path running perpendicularly to the food-side of the room.
llr*rlrrr af rrri *if,.filc !r;bC O+ grdil

As a result of their original training, the rats ha4 it would seem, acquired ' . f's. l?
not merely a strip-map to the effect that the original specifically trained- " (frpa E. C. ToluEar E. F. Riiclb *ld D.
on path led to food but, rather, a wider comprehensive map to the effect Erlish, Strdirs in rpattrl l*amiag. I. Ori-
that food was located in such and such a direction in the room. ' culatba and t!* rbort-ctrt. J. *i, Pt}thol,,

Consider now a furrher experiment done. by Ritchie alone. This experiment tested still fuithLr the brea&h of the spatial
map which is acquired. In this further experiment the rats were again run across the table-this time to the arms of a
simple T. (See Fig.18.)

Twenty-five animals were trained for seven days, 20 trials in all, to find food at F1i and twenty-five animals were
trained to find 'rt arF2. The L's in the diagram indicate lights. On the eighth day the starting path'and table top were
rotated through 180 degrees so that they,were now in the position shown in Fig.19. The dottted lines represent the old
position' And a series of radiating paths was added. What happened? Again the rats ran across the table into the central
alley. When, however, they found themselves blocked, they tumed back onto the table and this time also spent many
seconds touching and trying out for only a few steps practically all the paths. Finally, however, within seven minutei,

12
 E
g
*
.t2of the 50 rats chose one phthiand ran all the way out on it. The paths finally chosen 6y the 19 of these animals that
rad been fed at F1 and by the z$ttrat had been fedat F2 are shown in Fig.20. tp.205l

This time the rats tended to choose, not the paths which
pointed directly to the spots where the food had been, but
rather paths which ran perpendicularly to the
corresponding sides of the room. The spatial maps of these
rats, when the animals were started from the opposite side
of the room, were thus not completely adequate to the
precise goal positions but were adequate as to the cprrect
sides of the room. The.maps of these animals were, in
short, not altogether strip-like and narrow.

This completes my report of experiments. There were the

latent learning experiments, the WE experiments, the
searching for the stimulus experiment, the hypothesis
experiments, and these last spatial orientation
experiments.

And now, at last" I come to the humanly significant and

exciting problem: namely, what are the conditions which
Lg
favor narow strip-maps and what are those which tend to
favor broad comprehensive maps not only in rats but also
in men?
* I*st
n& u literature bearingion this question both for rats-and for
,ffi t"L'#ff",ffiffi ;'-#ffi=H,t*ff '*S*T;liT""il:HH:'f ;*:Ttr#*i#"f,t:f
fonrtt')
detail. I can merely summarize it by saying that narrow
'#.
Itrip maps rather than broad comprehensive maps seem to be induced: (1) by a damaged brain,
uray of environmentally presented cues, (3) by an [p.206]
A)iV fr inad.equate

ta
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I
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.\ rt
a
{ II
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t ta

l+ t|
a
I
,t
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13
 I

Frft ft : L
E
(F!o"t !. 3. Fiftte. ft.D, fttdr,
.Sprthl,l*r"lqg nE.r
- dtFodt q &c Hbrrrlr nf lh! UrttirCt, oil-fuAd#,+fog.trto.
& e
';
lry, Cdtforrlr) .4 r*
2
):

4
'6
.t
I
E
'*
&
E

-Hqftf Hparl ty Ftntr *n ttrr F, rup frthl th*Ht lr f$U xr ltr {, rnrp
ttrrr :
!r#i:
t!.r at
fis flt I
I
t

of
tta Urftlldty nI Callfrrair" Brrhehy, drlu"rt*i- -'-i
p'2071overdose of repetitions on the original
fained-on path and (a) bvthe presence of roo
str or too strongly
$rongly motirrafbnal
rf too strongly frustrating conditions. m or

t is this fourth factor which I wish to elaborate

rryon briefly in rny concluding remarks. For
it is going to be my
'ontention that some, at least, of the so-called 'nqicholffil Lechanismr'*nT"t tn"
cfinical psychologists and the
'ther students of personality have un"ouo.d uittt. deviis ;ddrd;ffi#;il individuir
an be interpreted as narrowings of our cognitive and sociir marajustments
*upr au.io#ff;;;";i;;[", o, to too-int*o;:straiion.
4y argument will be brie{ cavalier, and dogmatic.
For I am not myself a clinician or a social psycho*ogisf"
oing to say must be considered, therefore, what I am
iimply ur in trr. outo.. of a ratpsychologi*t,s raliocinations
offered free.
ty way of illustration, let me.suggest
that al least the three dynamisms called, respectively, ,,regression,,, ,,fixation,,,
nd "displacement of aggressign o-nto
outgroups" ur.
:t built up in us as a result of too viorent'moiivation ,*pr.rr"ions of cog-nitive maps which are too narow and which
"r';i;;';"1.";;"filffiffi:"
r)consider regressiol,This is the term used
for those cases in which an individua{ in tlu f,roe
:oblem' returns to earlier more childiJ of too difficult a
wgs oq behaving. Til, t^; t"#;il*-,
f'e overyrotected
oman (reported a couple of years ago middle-aged
in Time Magazni)who, after toring rr"irr'ubarad,
stress of her growing. daughiers) inio regressed (much to tho
dressing in tio youtrtnrJ a fashion *t"ol"t"
nally into behaving titce a irrito.i"quirinj tmpeting for their beaux red then
coninuo,r, i*r", *ouro be an ilrustrJli"orr"gr"ssion.
ru to put too much confidence in
tire reiortorial accuracy of-Time,b;tr;.h;;"."*o"*"
I would not wish
case is not too different ftom

14
 .-lf

E
#
nairy actually.to be found in ouffmental hospitals or even sorhetimes in ourselves. In all such instances my argument
*ot-tid be'(1) that t""l results from too strong u pt"t"oi rin and (2) that it consists in going
l:q.rsiof;
:ack to too narrow an earlier "*"if"if
map, itself due to too much frustration or motivation"ti""
in early ciritOtrooa. Time,s middle-
rged woman was presented by tgo an emotional situation at her husband's death and she regressed, I would
Tu:T.uling
ivager, to too narrow adolescent{and childhood maps since these latter had been originally excessively-impressed
Jecause of overstressful experiefces at the time she was growing up.

ib) Consider fixation-Rrgr"ssioff and fixation tend to go hand in hand. For another way of stating the fact of the undue
:ersistence of early maps is to s4y that they were fixated. This has even been demonstated in rats.
If rats are too
;trongly motivated h teiqlng, they find it very difficult to relearn when the original path is no longer
lh:1l:tigigat
:orrect' Also after th||}ave rlf$arned, if they are given an electric shock they, like Time,s woman, tend to ,.grr"r,
:ack again to choosing the earli6r path.

ic) Finally' consider the "displacement of aggrexion onto outgroups." Adherence to one's own
rresent tendency among primates. It is found in chimpanz"rr it d monkeys as strongly $oup is an ever-
in groups. And each:*t::1tt_ll,such_a_group tends to identify with his whole group
as in mei.uf pri*ut"s operate
in the sense that?e group,s
Soal's become his goals, t* flogPlt {re3no
immortality, his liie and immorrant!. rurtrrennore, each individual
trYrLruill soon
iearns thal when as an inoividuflih. ir frusfated, he must not take out his aggressions on
[p.20g] the other members
:f
Jr his v 7Y' group.
own 6r vq},' He
"" learns insilad to ur$Prase
displace ns
trir aggresslons
uggi"s.ioor ofto
ooto outgroups. such a displacement of aggression
^rrD
|oj"T,,,." assression I
:'^111_
would claim is also a,narroyosfortnl"ognitin.
:he cause of his frustration. The
g"f iroi"ia*iffi;;
irr" illr-g* to distinguish the true locus of
southern whites, who take it out on the Negroes, are dispiacing their
uggr"rrioo,
from the landlords, the southernleconomic system, the northern capitalists, o, *h*r"u.r
the true cause of their
tustration may lie,
"*"_=1-:1",$onvenient
o"1er*r The physiciJ;; th;iuffi wrro criticize the humanities, or we
rsychologists who criticize all the 6ther deparhnenti, or thi universltr a whole which criticizes the iecondary
Jchool systtn or, vice vers4 the Secondalry Sctrool system which criticizes I
the University-or, on a still larger and far
Ilsls dangerous scene-we Americans who criticize the Russians and the Russians who criticize us,
rt'least io p*t, in nothing more than such irrational displacements of our aggressions onto
;;ahJ"ngugin;
outgroups.
i do not mean to impiy that t_here may not be some true interferences by the one group with
the goals of the other and
rence that the aggressions of the members of the one grorrp against the memberJof dt"
other arJ necessarily wholly
tnd merely displaced aggressions. But I do assert that often ana in large part they are such mere
displacements.
Jver and over again men are blinded by too violent motivations and too intense frustrations into blind
and unintelligent
nd the end desperately dangerous hates of outsiders. And the expression of these their displac"a
ry
nay from discrimination against minorities to world conflagrations. -' lui"r ranges
*^D'" all the
,
What is the name of Heaven and Psychology can we do about it? My only answer is to preach again the virtues of
'eason-of, that is; b.o.ud cognitive maps. And to suggest that the child-trainers
and the world-pfuiortr lf
tlre future can
lnly, if at all, bring about the presence of the required rationality (r.e., comprehensive maps) if *.y see to it that
robody's children are too over-motivated or too frustrated. Only then can tlrese children learn to look before
and after,
eam to see that tlere are often round-about and safer paths to their quite proper goals-leam, that is,
to realize that the'
rell-beings of White and of Negro, of Catholic and of Protestant, of Chiitiun urid of J.*, of a*.ti.*
and of
lussian(andevenofmalesand'fema1es)aremutuallyinterdependent.

We dare not let ourselves or others becorne so over-emotional, so hungty, so ill-clad, so over-motivated
that only
9n9y itrip-maps will be developed. Al1 of us in Europe as well as iriAmericq in *re Orient as well as in the
)coident, must be ma{e calm enough and well-fed enough to be_ able to develop truly comprehensive **pr,
rreud would have put it, to be able to leam.to live according or, u,
to the Realify trinfiple ratherihan according to the too
rarrow and too immediate Pleasure principle.

ile must, in short, subject our children and ourselves (as the kindly experimenter would his rats)
to the optimal
:onditions of moderate motivationiand of an absence of unnecessary ftustrations, whenerc;
rcfore that great God-given maze which is our human world. I cannot predict whether or not we
;;
d; tfr"", *A ourselves
will be able, or be
rllowed, ,to do this; but I can say that, only insofar as we are able and are allowed, have we cause
for hope. .

15
 Footnotes

[1] 34& Annual Faculty Research Lecture, delivered at the University of California" Berkeley, March 17, 1947.
Presented also on March 26, L947 as one in a series of lectures in Dynamic Psychology sponsored by the division of
psycholory of Western Reserve University, Cleveland, Ohio.
i
l2l Ytde: K.F. Muenzinger, Vicaiious nial and error at a point of choice: I.A general survey of its relation to learning
efficiency. J.genet. Psyehot.,1938, 53, 75-86.

[3] F.M. Geie+ M. Levin & E.C. Tolman, Individual differences in emotionaiity,'hypothesis formation, vicarious trial
and error and visual discriminatkln Ieaming in rats. Comp. Psychol. Mornr., L94L,17,No.3.
ir
[4] L.L Jackson, V.T.E. m a{elevrted maze. J.comp. Psychal, 1943,36,99-rc7.
#
tr
*4

16
I