Département écologie, physiologie et éthologie, IPHC, Centre national de la recherche scientifique, université de Strasbourg, France.
C R Biol. 2010 Feb;333(2):188-96. doi: 10.1016/j.crvi.2009.12.007. Epub 2010 Feb 11.
In The Expression of the Emotions, Charles Darwin documents evolutionary continuity between animals and humans, emphasizing the universality of expressions in man. Most of the book addresses human behavior, and its influence on the study of animal behavior has been weak. The issue of natural selection is remarkably absent from this book, which relies on the inheritance of acquired characters rather than on a genuine Darwinian logic. Yet Konrad Lorenz considered Darwin to be a forerunner of behavioral biology. The reason was to be found in The Descent of Man and chapter VIII of The Origin of Species, where Darwin provides an explanation of behavior through selection, stating that the same mechanisms explaining morphological changes also account for gradual improvements in instincts. He assessed the accuracy of his evolutionary theory by directly studying animal behavior, hence laying the foundations of behavioral research for the next century.
在《情感的表达》一书中，查尔斯·达尔文记录了动物和人类之间的进化连续性，强调了表情在人类中的普遍性。这本书的大部分内容都涉及人类行为，对动物行为研究的影响一直很薄弱。自然选择的问题在这本书中并没有出现，它依赖于后天获得的特征的遗传，而不是真正的达尔文逻辑。然而，康拉德·洛伦兹认为达尔文是行为生物学的先驱。原因在于《人类的由来》和《物种起源》的第八章，达尔文通过选择对行为做出解释，指出同样的机制不仅可以解释形态变化，也可以解释本能的逐渐改善。他通过直接研究动物行为来评估他的进化理论的准确性，从而为下一个世纪的行为研究奠定了基础。
