ABSTRACT
Do animals pretend? This deceptively simple question with its modern ring was critically examined more than 100 years ago by Groos (1898, 1901). Before and since, diverse reasons have been offered for or against the proposition (Mitchell, 2002b). Darwin (1871/1896) and his supporters easily accepted the idea that animals are pretending when play-fighting, playing with objects, teasing, and deceiving. For them, such activities showed imagination, even though (unlike children’s pretenses) animal pretenses seemed limited in scope. Groos offered an alternative interpretation of apparent pretense in play: These activities are simply the pleasurable acting out of instincts prior to their usefulness in adult life; they simulate adult behaviors, but without awareness of the simulation, functioning as practice. Yet Darwin’s interpretation was, Groos believed, potentially accurate: When animal players had experienced the real activity that was practiced in play, they might (as human children do) become aware of the similarities and differences between their play behavior and the behavior it simulates, and thus come to act out a role while playing. The two views of play, as either unintentional (often instinctual) simulation, usually for practice (see Smith, chap. 2, this
volume), or intentional simulation (pretense), perhaps also for practice, remain active interpretations of animal play (Mitchell, 1990, 2002b). However, pretense is broader than play.
