The boyhood of a hippopotamus probably isn't so bad after all, two animal experts at the University agreed yesterday. An associate curator of Mammalogy and Richard L. Solomon, associate professor of Social Psychology, both took issue with a Belgian zoologist who claims--according to last Sunday's New York Times--that the young male hippo suffers from "a complex of fear and frustration."

"Who is to say whether a hippopotamus is 'frustrated' or not?" asked the mammalologist. "You may offer him some hay and then take it away just before he takes a big bite, and he may then growl, grunt, squeal, or do whatever a hippopotamus does, but that does not necessarily mean he's 'frustrated'," he added.

Solomon agreed that "even if you had a hippopotamus in a laboratory, you couldn't tell whether he was frustrated or not." This would require a rather large laboratory anyhow, the professor pointed out.

Meanwhile, the Assistant Curator of Mammals and Birds of the Bronx Zoo reported that the two young male hippopotamuses there have shown no evidence of fear, frustration, or domination by females--as the Belgian zoologist contends. "Of course the environment may make a difference," Miss Grace Duvall added.

According to the University mammalogist, however, the young hippos at the zoo are enjoying only a temporary freedom from subordination to their mates. "When they reach sexual maturity the female will become dominant, just as is the case with elks, elephants, and seals," he predicted.