Now available in paperback, this is a how-and-why-to-do-it book. It presents sophisticated statistical methods for analysing continuous-time records of behaviour, aiming to integrate recent developments in ethology, mathematical modelling, statistics, and technology. These new methods are explicitly designed to handle sequential or simultaneous acts where neither the duration nor the sequence of the acts is predetermined, which is often the case if the time scale
on which behaviour is studied is relatively short. The authors show how to analyse behavioural data starting with a basic model, the continuous time Markov chain. They then indicate how and when this model can be generalized and demonstrate the suitability of their approach for detecting, for
example, the effects of different experimental treatments or of changes in the social or physical environment. Competitive interactions such as predator-prey or host-parasite are also good subjects for this type of analysis.

There are eight chapters and many worked examples, leading the reader through the mathematical processes and their applications. Students and researchers in all fields of behavioural science wil find this book incomparably useful for planning and performing data analysis.