The Genesis of Animal Play Gordon M. Burghardt Behavioral play in animals. From birds to reptiles and vertebrate play. Emphasizes on 3 types of plays: Locomotor, Object, and Social. Tables and charts explainning which animals participate in the types of play described by the author. It also rates the overall play behavior of animals from 1.0 (lowest score) to 3.0 (highest score). I found this to be extremely helpful in deciding which animasl I might be able to collaborate with for projects that could actually be successful.
"Recall that exploration is a response to novelty itself; animals manipulate objects to test them and gain information. Play occurs only when the animal repeatedly engages and interacts with the object in order to "see what I can do with it." Exploration of a given stimulus habitutates quickly; even if the stimulus is removed and reintrodced later, it evokes little further response. This distinction between play and curiosity is particularly important in evaluating object play in birds" (Burghardt, 248).
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