![]() ![]() Interestingly, even though five females over this time-span could theoretically produce 5,000 healthy progeny for this size pen, Calhoun found that the population never exceeded 200 individuals, and stabilized at 150, similar to the Dunbar number. In March 1947, he began a 28-month study of a colony of Norway rats in a 10,000-square-foot (930 m 2) outdoor pen. Calhoun worked on the Rodent Ecology Project at Johns Hopkins University. In 1946, he and his wife, Edith, moved to Towson, Maryland, a suburb of Baltimore. 1943-1949Īfter graduating from Northwestern, he taught at Emory University and Ohio State University. It was at Northwestern that he met his future wife, Edith Gressley, who was a biology major and a student in one of his classes. The subject of his thesis was the 24-hour rhythms of the Norway rat. During the summers, he worked for Alexander Wetmore, who was assistant secretary of the Smithsonian Institution in Washington DC, doing ornithology work. His first published article was in The Migrant, the journal of the Tennessee Ornithological Society, when he was 15 years old.ĭespite his father’s refusal to help him attend an out-of-state university, Calhoun made his way to the University of Virginia where he earned his bachelor’s degree in 1939. ![]() Calhoun spent his junior high and high school years banding birds and recording the habits of birds. Laskey, distinguished for her work in bird banding and in the study of the chimney swift, was a pivotal influence on his developing interest in birds and bird habits. His family moved from Elkton to Brownsville, Tennessee, and finally to Nashville, when Calhoun was in junior high school.Īt this time, he began attending meetings of the Tennessee Ornithological Society. ![]() His father was a high school principal who rose to a position in administration in the Tennessee Department of Education. Calhoun had three siblings: an older sister, Polly, and two younger brothers, Billy and Dan. John Bumpass Calhoun was born in Elkton, Tennessee, the third child of James Calhoun and Fern Madole Calhoun. Calhoun’s rat studies were used as a basis in the development of Edward T. He spoke at conferences around the world and his opinion was sought by groups as diverse as NASA and the District of Columbia’s Panel on overcrowding in local jails. During his studies, Calhoun coined the term “behavioral sink” to describe aberrant behaviors in overcrowded population density situations and “beautiful ones” to describe passive individuals who withdrew from all social interaction. Calhoun (– September 7, 1995) was an American ethologist and behavioral researcher noted for his studies of population density and its effects on behavior. ![]()
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