A pioneering work on the social insects, with considerable detail including formation and maintenance of nests, relation of ants to plants and animals, behavior, recognition of friends, power of communications, senses, intelligence, etc, with most of the work related to ants.
Lubbock's pioneering and widely read studies of insect behavior were important to the development of comparative psychology. An imaginative and ingenious experimenter, Lubbock introduced specificity into the study of insect behavior by marking individuals with paint for identification, a practice that later became common. He also used obstacles and mazes to test the intelligence of ants, thus anticipating animal psychologists like Kohler.
