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The contents have been divided into three sections: Central Nervous Sys- tem and Sexual Behavior; Pheromones and Hormones in Reproductive Behavior; Behavioral and Social Determinants of Reproductive Behav- iour. The first section covers neural and hormonal relationships in sexual and maternal behaviour of rats. The second ranges over pheromones, social behav- iour, puberty, sex differentiation, mounting behaviour and hormones, quoting work with mice, rats, rhesus monkeys and other non-human primates. The third section starts with the concept that behaviour controls reproductive physiology (N.T. Adler), includes dominance and aggression studies in the male Japanese Macaque (G.G. Eaton), and finishes with papers on the fertility of American women in general (L.L. Bumpass) and minority groups in particular (H.L. Browning). The concluding and special lecture by Beach expresses his syn- thesis of the evolution of human sexuality and its distinction from sex. Ethol- ogists, in the Lorenzian meaning of the term, should find plenty of diversity and stimulus for comparison in this assortment.

The conference itself was, no doubt, an invigorating experience but the edited proceedings lack theme and cohesion. A wealth of information from disparate sources is collected between hard covers and as such provides a series of valuable summaries.

The value of this volume to workers in applied animal ethology would be as a source of authoritative but brief reviews in the intensively studied labora- tory animal reproductive physiology field. One could certainly recommend purchase for a biological research library but there can be few workers who would justify a personal copy at US $30.00.

ROBERT J. HOLMES (Palmerston North, New Zealand)

Hormones and Sexual Behauior. Benchmark Papers in Animal Behavior, Vol. 1. Carol Sue Carter (Editor). Dowden, Hutchinson & Ross, Stroudsburg, Pa./Wiley and Sons, Chichester, 1974, 362 pp., US $20.00.

This volume on Hormones and Sexual Behavior is part of a series of Bench- mark Papers in the pure and applied sciences. The series in Animal Behavior is edited by Martin W. Schein of West Virginia University. This volume, edited by Carol Sue Carter, is the first in the series, and has several purposes set within the framework of animal behavior and the great growth of related textbooks and journals. Several purposes are set out. For the teacher, the volume should be a supplement presenting selected original research papers of outstanding quality. For the researcher, basic articles are collected from diverse and frequently difficult to procure sources. For the student, the col- lection should provide an accessible set of original papers revealing seminal contributions. For the librarian, the collection should be an economically

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available solution to the difficulties of securing and maintaining widely diver- gent sources. Thus, the purposes are many.

The volume contains 36 selected articles, which are arranged into four groups: hormones and the behavior of the male (11); hormones and the behavior of the female (7); hormones and the behavior of both sexes, and hormones and sexual differentiation (4). These papers are all in English, and vary through time from a translation of Steinach’s (1894) paper in Pfliiger’s Archive, to 1967. The volume opens with a seven-page introduction, which provides the platform for the collection. The emphasis is on mammalian sexual behavior, and centers about the reliability of the relationship between gonadal secretions and sexual behavior.

The design of the volume is to sample the kinds of basic research that have contributed to current understanding, even though further work and invalid assumptions may have altered the significance of the contributions. Each of the papers has been selected because of its historical and theoretical impact on the current state of the science.

A brief and effective history of the area is presented, mentioning Aristotle, medieval Chinese alchemists, after pointing out that sexual responses, in con- trast to other aspects of behavior, have been considered “unfit or unrespect- able” topics for scientific investigation. The classic work of Berthold in 1849 on testicular tissue transplantation in chickens is mentioned, as well as the birth of endocrinology by Starling (1905). The first papers (Steinach, 1894 and Brown-Sequard, 1889) in the book then act to place the remaining selections in history of endocrinology. The contributions of experimental psychologists start with Stone (1927) and continues. Selections from research with primates and humans are treated sparingly, and this is due to the lack of reliable sources, or to the recency of the work. The volume emphasizes hor- monal and physiological changes capable of influencing sexual behavior. The growth and proliferation of this research area is indicated, and the reader is provided with a listing of general sources: books, review articles, and journals as additional sources. The papers in each section are grouped by the editor’s comments which act to introduce them, and to place them into a context of importance, interest and impact.

While one can argue about the exclusion of a specific contribution, I believe that the key contributors are represented, and further that the editor has been competent, and successful in introducing, placing, and commenting upon the selection and its current meaning. The collection - in spite of the variance in reporting style, knowledge requirements, etc., hangs together. For the student, it provides an attractive and handy collection of historically significant contributions. For the researcher, these are basic articles in a scattered literature. For the teacher, this collection is a valuable supplement to textbooks and other materials. For the librarian, it solves many problems of collecting from manifold sources.

SHERMAN ROSS (Washington, D.C., U.S.A.)