Record

Authorised form of name	Tinbergen; Nikolaas (1907 - 1988)
Other forms of name	Niko
Dates	1907 - 1988
Nationality	Dutch
Date of birth	15/04/1907
Date of death	21/12/1988
Occupation	Biologist
Research field	Animal behaviour
	Ethology
	Zoology
	Human behaviour
	Autism
Activity	Medals and prizes: Nobel Prize (Physiology or Medicine) 1973
Membership category	Fellow
Date of election	25/03/1962
Age at election	54
RSActivity	Lectures: Croonian 1972
Relationships	Son of Dirk Cornelis Tinbergen and his wife Jeannette van Eek.; Married Elisabeth 'Lies' Rutten (1932); Brother of Jan Tinbergen, nobel prize winning economist; Uncle of Joost Tinbergen who also worked as one of his researchers
OtherInfo	Nikolaas 'Niko' Tinbergen, Dutch biologist, ornithologist and animal behaviourist, was born 15 April 1907 and died 21 December 1988. He is regarded as one of the founders of modern ethology; the study of animal behaviour. In 1973 he shared the Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine with Karl von Frisch and Konrad Lorenz for their discoveries concerning organisation and elicitation of individual and social behaviour patterns in animals. He was elected Fellow of the Royal Society in 1962. Tinbergen moved from Leiden to England in 1949 and taught at the University of Oxford where he was a fellow first at Merton College and later at Wolfson College. In 1951, he published 'The Study of Instinct', an influential book on animal behaviour. In the 1960s and 70s, he collaborated with filmmaker Hugh Falkus on a series of wildlife films, including The Riddle of the Rook (1972) and Signals for Survival (1969). He was appointed Professor of Animal Behaviour in 1966 and retired in 1974. At Oxford Tinbergen built up 'The Animal Behaviour Research Group' which had a profound influence on the development of ethology round the world. In particular, his research focused on the adaptedness of behaviour; work on the herring gull he had initiated in the Netherlands developed into comparative studies of many gull species. The Group had a field base at Walney Island. Several of his graduate students went on to become prominent biologists including Richard Dawkins FRS, Marian Dawkins, Desmond Morris, Iain Douglas-Hamilton, Bill Hamilton, John Krebs FRS, Mike Cullen and Tony Sinclair. Tinbergen also applied his observational methods to the problems of autistic children. After retiring from Oxford University in 1974, he and his wife, Lies Tinbergen, collaborated on a study of childhood autism publishing 'Autistic Children - new hope for a cure' in 1983.
Source	AssocMaterial: Catalogues NCUACS 27/3/9; NCUACS 79/8/98; NCUACS 163/6/08. Papers deposited in the Department of Western Manuscripts, Bodleian Library, Oxford Obituaries: Biographical Memoirs of Fellows of the Royal Society 1990 vol 36 pp 547-565, plate, by R A Hinde
Code	NA1869

Archives associated with this Fellow

RefNo	Title	Date
EC/1962/24	Tinbergen, Nikolaas: certificate of election to the Royal Society
MS/924/2/12	Notecards from Nikolaas Tinbergen to Lawrence Shaffer	c. 1967-1990
MS/924/2/1	Letters of Nikolaas Tinbergen to Lawrence Shaffer with associated papers 1967	1967
MS/924/2/6	Letters of Nikolaas Tinbergen to Lawrence Shaffer with associated papers 1972	1972
MS/924/2/2	Letters of Nikolaas Tinbergen to Lawrence Shaffer with associated papers 1968	1968
MS/924/1/3	Photo negatives of Nikolaas Tinbergen and the Oxford Animal Behaviour Research Group by Lawrence Shaffer	1968-1976
MS/924/2	Correspondence and associated papers of Nikolaas and Lies Tinbergen to Lawrence and Beth Shaffer	1967-1990
MS/924/1/1	Photographs of Nikolaas Tinbergen by Lawrence Shaffer	1970
MS/924/2/3	Letters of Nikolaas Tinbergen to Lawrence Shaffer with associated papers 1969	1969
MS/924/2/4	Letters of Nikolaas Tinbergen to Lawrence Shaffer with associated papers 1970	1970
MS/924/2/8	Letters of Nikolaas Tinbergen to Lawrence Shaffer with associated papers 1974	1974
IM/GA/WRS/9060	Tinbergen, Nikolaas	nd
MS/924/2/9	Letters of Nikolaas and Lies Tinbergen to Lawrence and Beth Shaffer with associated papers 1975	1975
MS/924/2/10	Letters of Nikolaas and Lies Tinbergen to Lawrence and Beth Shaffer with associated papers 1976	1976
MS/924/2/11	Letters of Nikolaas and Lies Tinbergen to Lawrence and Beth Shaffer with associated papers 1977-1990	1977-1990
MS/924/1	Photographic material relating to Nikolaas Tinbergben and the Oxford Animal Behaviour Research Group	c.1968-1990
MS/924/1/2	Photographic slides of Nikolaas Tinbergen and the Oxford Animal Behaviour Research Group by Lawrence Shaffer	1969-1974
MS/924/2/5	Letters of Nikolaas Tinbergen to Lawrence Shaffer with associated papers 1971	1971
MS/924/2/7	Letters of Nikolaas Tinbergen to Lawrence Shaffer with associated papers 1973	1973
MS/924	Correspondence and photographic material of Nikolaas Tinbergen and the Oxford Animal Behaviour Research Group, compiled by Lawrence Shaffer	1967-1990

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