Who studied animal imprinting?

Konrad Lorenz was an Austrian zoologist, ornithologist, and ethologist who studied animal imprinting. He was one of the pioneers of the field of ethology, the study of animal behavior, and his work on imprinting is considered to be one of the most important contributions to the field.

Imprinting is a phenomenon in which a young animal learns to recognize and attach to a particular object, usually its mother. Lorenz's experiments with geese showed that goslings would imprint on the first moving object they saw after hatching, even if it was not a goose. This showed that imprinting was not a genetically predetermined behavior, but rather a learned response.

Lorenz's work on imprinting has had a profound impact on our understanding of animal behavior and development. It has also helped to explain some of the ways in which humans learn and develop.