Showing papers on "Reinforcement published in 1983"

Conditioning and associative learning

Abstract: The study of conditioning in animals Classical and instrumental conditioning Theoretical analysis of classical conditioning Theoretical analysis of instrumental conditioning Appetitive and aversive reinforcement Avoidance learning Contiguity and contingency: excitatory and inhibitory conditioning Laws of association Discrimination learning References Indexes.

The analysis of behavioral momentum.

Abstract: Learned behavior varies in its resistance to change, depending on the rate of reinforcement. Resistance to change may be characterized as behavioral momentum, which in turn may be analyzed into terms corresponding to mass and velocity in classical physics. Behavioral mass may be inferred from changes in response rate when experimental conditions are altered. Relevant data were obtained by training pigeons to peck a key on two-component multiple variable-interval, variable-interval schedules. Six pigeons were studied on three pairs of variable-interval schedules in all possible orders. When performance stabilized, resistance to change was assessed by arranging response-independent food during periods between components and by extinction. For each operation, the data for all schedule performances converged onto a single function, permitting estimation of the ratio of behavioral masses for each pair of schedules. The response-independent food data suggested that the ratio of behavioral masses is a power function of the ratio of reinforcement rates and that behavioral mass may be measured on a ratio scale.

Observing and conditioned reinforcement

Abstract: When experimenters require their subjects to perform some readily recorded response to gain access to discriminative stimuli but do not permit this behavior to alter the schedule of reinforcement, the response is classified, by analogy, as an “observing” response Observing responses have been used not only to analyze discrimination learning but also to substantiate the concept of conditioned reinforcement and to measure the reinforcing effect of stimuli serving other behavioral functions A controversy, however, centers around the puzzling question of how observing can be sustained when the resulting stimuli are not associated with any increase in the frequency of primary reinforcement Two possible answers have been advanced: (a) that differential preparatory responses to these stimuli as conditional stimuli make both the receipt and the nonreceipt of unconditional stimuli more reinforcing; and (b) that information concerning biologically significant events is inherently reinforcing It appears, however, that the stimulus associated with the less desirable outcome is not reinforcing The maintenance of observing can be reconciled with the traditional theory that the acquisition of reinforcing properties proceeds according to the same rules as those for Pavlovian conditioning if it is recognized that the subject is selective in what it observes and procures a greater than proportionate exposure to the stimulus associated with the more desirable outcome As a result of this selection, the overall frequency of primary reinforcement increases in the presence of the observed stimuli and declines in the presence of the nondifferential stimuli that prevail when the subject is not observing

Another look at contrast in multiple schedules

Abstract: Recent research on multiple schedule interactions is reviewed. Contrary to formulations that view contrast as the result of elicited behavior controlled by the stimulus-reinforcer contingency (e.g., additivity theory), the major controlling variable is the relative rate of reinforcement, which cannot be reduced to some combination of stimulus-reinforcer and response-reinforcer effects. Other recent theoretical formulations are also reviewed and all are found to face serious counterevidence. The best description of the available data continues to be in terms of the "context of reinforcement," but Herrnstein's (1970) formulation of the basis of such context effects appears to be inadequate. An alternative conception is provided by Catania's concept of "inhibition by reinforcement," by which rate of responding is inversely related to the average rate of reinforcement in the situation. Such a conception is related to Gibbon's recent scalar-expectancy account of autoshaping and Fantino's delay-reduction model of conditioned reinforcement, suggesting that a common set of principles determines several diverse conditioning phenomena. However, the empirical status of such a description remains uncertain, because recent evidence shows that schedule interactions are temporally asymmetric, depending primarily upon the conditions of reinforcement that follow a schedule component.

Hill-climbing by pigeons

Abstract: Pigeons were exposed to two types of concurrent operant-reinforcement schedules in order to determine what choice rules determine behavior on these schedules. In the first set of experiments, concurrent variable-interval, variable-interval schedules, key-peck responses to either of two alternative schedules produced food reinforcement after a random time interval. The frequency of food-reinforcement availability for the two schedules was varied over different ranges for different birds. In the second series of experiments, concurrent variable-ratio, variable-interval schedules, key-peck responses to one schedule produced food reinforcement after a random time interval, whereas food reinforcement occurred for an alternative schedule only after a random number of responses. Results from both experiments showed that pigeons consistently follow a behavioral strategy in which the alternative schedule chosen at any time is the one which offers the highest momentary reinforcement probability (momentary maximizing). The quality of momentary maximizing was somewhat higher and more consistent when both alternative reinforcement schedules were time-based than when one schedule was time-based and the alternative response-count based. Previous attempts to provide evidence for the existence of momentary maximizing were shown to be based upon faulty assumptions about the behavior implied by momentary maximizing and resultant inappropriate measures of behavior.

Human observing: Maintained by stimuli correlated with reinforcement but not extinction.

Abstract: College students received points exchangeable for money (reinforcement) on a variable-time 60-second schedule that alternated randomly with an extinction component. Subjects were informed that responding would not influence either the rate or distribution of reinforcement. Instead, presses on either of two levers (“observing responses”) produced stimuli. In each of four experiments, stimuli positively correlated with reinforcement and/or stimuli uncorrelated with reinforcement were each chosen over stimuli correlated with extinction. These results are consistent with prior results from pigeons in supporting the conditioned-reinforcement hypothesis of observing and in not supporting the uncertainty-reduction hypothesis.

A parametric evaluation of the hedonic and motoric effects of drugs: pimozide and amphetamine

Abstract: This study uses a curve-fitting approach to evaluate the effects of drugs on reinforced responding in rats. The subjects obtained reinforcement according to a series of five different variable-interval schedules (a five-component multiple schedule). For each rat, pimozide, a neuroleptic, decreased response rate, and the decrease was associated with (1) a decrease in the estimated asymptotic response rate and (2) an increase in the rate of reinforcement necessary for half-asymptotic responding. That is, pimozide decreased the proportion of responding maintained by a given rate of reinforcement. In contrast, intermediate doses of amphetamine increased response rate and increased the proportion of responding maintained by a given rate of reinforcement. It was proposed that the response rate asymptote indexes motor capacity, and the rate of reinforcement necessary for half-asymptotic responding indexes reinforcement efficacy; accordingly, pimozide decreased motor capacity and reinforcement strength and amphetamine increased reinforcement strength.

The negative side effects of reward.

Abstract: The negative side effects of aversive control have been extensively discussed in clinical literature and textbooks. The symmetry between aversive and appetitive control in basic experimental research implies that parallel negative side effects of reward exist. These negative side effects are described and their implications for clinical practice and research are discussed.

Sensitivity to reinforcement in concurrent arithmetic and exponential schedules.

Abstract: The generalized matching law states that the logarithm of the ratio of responses emitted or time spent responding in concurrent variable-interval schedules is a linear function of the logarithm of the ratio of reinforcements obtained. The slope of this relation, sensitivity to reinforcement, varies about 1.0 but has been shown to be different when obtained in different laboratories. The present paper analyzed the results from 18 experiments on concurrent variable-interval schedule performance and showed that response-allocation sensitivity to reinforcement was significantly smaller when arithmetic, rather than exponential, progressions were used to produce variable-interval schedules. There were no differences in time-allocation sensitivity between the two methods of constructing variable-interval schedules. Since the two laboratories have consistently used different methods for constructing variable-interval schedules, the differences in obtained sensitivities to reinforcement are explained. The reanalysis suggests that animals may be sensitive to differences in the distribution of reinforcements in time.

Dissociable effects of d-amphetamine, chlordiazepoxide and α-flupenthixol on choice and rate measures of reinforcement in the rat

Abstract: The role of reinforcers in influencing choice was studied by use of a schedule that included a random intermixing of reinforced and explicitly non-reinforced components The just-reinforced response had a high likelihood of being repeated (win-stay), although there was no differential reinforcement for doing so, whereas responses just followed by explicit non-reinforcement had a very low probability of repetition (lose-stay) Non-parametric indices based on the theory of signal detection were used to derive a choice measure of reinforcement which was independent of alterations in average response rate Treatments with d-amphetamine (02–45 mg/kg), chlordiazepoxide (025–16 mg/kg) and α-flupenthixol (003–06 mg/kg) showed that changes in the choice measure could be dissociated from changes in the response rate These findings were supported by extinction and satiation tests

Drug dependence: myth or motive?

Abstract: The acceptability of nonmedical use for a particular drug is a function of diverse social needs. Drug dependence is due less to intrinsic effects than to the situation in which drug taking occurs. An addictive level of drug self-administration is a symptom of behavioral troubles rather than a definition of the trouble itself. The intrinsic effects of drugs do not in themselves produce either misuse or evoke specific kinds of behavior such as sexual or aggressive activities. Drugs can, however, come to function as discriminative stimuli for socially sanctioned behavior that would not under other circumstances be tolerated. The intrinsic reinforcing potential of an agent evolves in and dominates situations in which other reinforcing opportunities are either absent or remain unavailable to an individual who is unprepared to exploit them. While certain intrinsic properties of a drug contribute to its potential as a reinforcer (e.g., rapid onset and brief duration of action), reinforcing efficacy is notoriously malleable. It is a function of historic and currently-acting factors, particularly social reinforcers. The importance of physical dependence in the maintenance of drug seeking and taking is mainly unproven and probably overrated. Situations under which important reinforcers are available only in small portions intermittently can induce various excessive activities, including an untoward concern with obtaining and using drugs. Drug dependence prevention as a species of environmental dependence can be best effected by either alterations in the intermittent reinforcement situations inducing excessive behavior or by providing opportunities and training with respect to reinforcing alternatives other than drugs.

Temporal constraint on choice: sensitivity and bias in multiple schedules

Abstract: In multiple schedules of reinforcement, ratios of responses in successive components are relatively insensitive to ratios of obtained reinforcers. An analysis is proposed that attributes changes in absolute response rates to concurrent interactions between programmed reinforcement and extraneous reinforcement in other components. The analysis predicts that ratios of responses in successive components vary with reinforcer ratios, qualified by a term describing the reinforcement context, that is, programmed and extraneous reinforcers. Two main predictions from the analysis were confirmed in an experiment in which pigeons' responses were reinforced in the components of a multiple schedule and analog extraneous reinforcement was scheduled for an alternative response in each component. Sensitivity of response and time ratios to reinforcer ratios in the multiple schedules varied as a function of the rate of extraneous reinforcers. Bias towards responding in one component of the multiple schedule varied as an inverse function of the ratios of extraneous reinforcer rate in the two components. The data from this and previous studies of multiple-concurrent performance were accurately predicted by our analysis and supported our contention that the allocation of behavior in multiple-schedule components depends on the relative values of concurrently-available reinforcers within each component.

Dentists’ Behavior Management as it Affects Compliance and Fear in Pediatric Patients

Abstract: Fear of dentistry is a significant impediment to dental health care. In this study, various applications of reinforcement conditions for use by the dentist are studied for effectiveness in children.

The influence of partial reinforcement on serial autoshaping with pigeons

Abstract: The effect of partial reinforcement on the rate of responding during the first element of a serial compound was investigated using autoshaping in pigeons. Experiment I employed the illumination of a response key by two different colours as the elements of the compound. Responding during the first element was faster when this stimulus was intermittently paired with the second element and the unconditioned stimulus than when a continuous reinforcement schedule was employed. Experiment II demonstrated that this effect of partial reinforcement is unaffected by maniuplating the associative strength of the second element at the outset of compound conditioning. A similar effect of partial reinforcement was also found in Experiment III which used a tone as the first element of the serial compound.

Maladaptive functional relations in client verbal behavior.

Abstract: Skinner's analysis of verbal behavior is applied in this paper to several kinds of maladaptive behavior with which clinicians must deal. Lying, denial, and poor observing skills are discussed as defective tacting repertoires. Demanding and manipulative behaviors are mands that obtain immediate reinforcement at the expense of disrupting long-term interpersonal relations. Obsessing is runaway intraverbal behavior. Variables that enter into the maladaptive functional relations are examined.

Acceptability of Time Out from Reinforcement Procedures for Disruptive Child Behavior: A Further Analysis.

Abstract: Forty-eight teachers and forty-eight parents evaluated the effectiveness and acceptability of five behavioral procedures for reducing disruptive behavior in children. The results showed that teachers evaluated the procedures as being more effective and acceptable than did the parents. The treatment procedures rated as most effective and acceptable were reinforcement and isolation and contractual agreement. In additon, the procedures were rated as being more effective and acceptable for 5-year-olds than for 10-year-olds. The results of this study are compared to similiar studies reported by Kazdin.

Control rate of response or reinforcement and amphetamine's effect on behavior

Abstract: The roles of control response rate and reinforcement frequency in producing amphetamine's effect on operant behavior were evaluated independently in rats. Two multiple schedules were arranged in which one variable, either response rate or reinforcement frequency, was held constant and the other variable manipulated. A multiple differential-reinforcement-of-low-rate seven-second yoked variable-interval schedule was used to equate reinforcement frequencies at different control response rates between multiple-schedule components. Amphetamine increased responding under the variable-interval component. In contrast, amphetamine decreased responding equivalently between components of a multiple random-ratio schedule that produced similar control response rates at different reinforcement frequencies. The results provide experimental support to the rate-dependency principle that control rate of responding is an important determinant of amphetamine's effect on operant behavior.

A laboratory investigation of grid reinforcements in clay

Abstract: The governing criteria for internal stability of reinforced soil require that the soil reinforcement should have adequate factors of safety against tensile fracture and pullout. In terms of total stress the pull-out resistance will be some function of the area of reinforcement embedded in the restraint zone and the soil-reinforcement adhesion that may be related to the undrained shear strength of the soil by an adhesion factor. This factor has been assessed for several types of reinforcement using a direct shear box with the reinforcement inclined across the two halves of the box. These tests showed grid reinforcement to be the most efficient, consequently, subsequent testing, in the form of pull-out and shear box tests with horizontal reinforcement, was restricted to grids. The adhesion factors were found to be markedly dependent on test method with the pull-out test giving the lowest values. An analytical assessment of the results suggests that grid pull-out resistance is a function of the area of grid members normal and parallel to the direction of applied load rather than embedded plan area.

Leader Influence Through Operant Principles: A Theoretical and Methodological Framework

Abstract: Leader influence is analyzed in terms of operant theory The characteristics of leader-mediated stimuli and the way they are tied to the subordinate's newly exhibited and already acquired behavior are proposed as critical determinants of leader influence Dependent parameters of leader influence on subordinate motivation and behavior acquisition are identified The relevant literature on learning and leadership is reviewed and a number of hypotheses are suggested Constraints on leader influence through the manipulation of reinforcement and punishment are discussed Requirements of the operant methodology are examined These suggest that future research on the effects of leader reinforcement should use rigorous experimentation and the procedures of behavior observation

Properties and Function of an Internal Clock

Abstract: Publisher Summary The term “time discrimination” has no exact meaning, but the common examples of it share two properties: (1) the probability of some learned response changes with the time since some event, and (2) the function relating response probability and time changes with the time of the motivating event—for example, food or shock. The inhibition-of-delay results of Pavlov were the first examples of animal time discrimination. One of Pavlov's examples, originally published in 1980, used as the conditioned stimulus (CS) the sound of a whistle. During the first minute of the whistle, there were zero drops of saliva, during the second minute, about five drops, and during the third minute, about nine drops. In addition, Pavlov found that the pause before salivating was proportional to the length of the CS; this satisfies the second condition. The introduction by Skinner of fixed-interval schedules of reinforcement made it much easier to observe timing, especially in rats. Skinner was training rats in the first Skinner boxes. He began by rewarding every response, but changed to rewarding responses only once a minute (a fixed-interval schedule) to make his supply of pellets last longer. After training with this procedure, a cumulative record of the number of responses showed the now-familiar fixed-interval scallops-response rate was low at the beginning of the interval and much higher near the end.

Rate-dependent effects of amphetamine on responding under random-interval schedules of reinforcement in the rat

Abstract: The parameters of 12 random-interval schedules (cycle length and interreinforcement interval) were varied systematically in order to examine the ability of these schedules to separate the usual relationship between response rate and reinforcement frequency using rats. Response rates varied over a two-fold range for the same frequency of reinforcement under random-interval 30-sec schedules. However, cycle length did not alter response rates significantly at other interreinforcement intervals. Subsequently, the effects of amphetamine on random-interval responding were examined in order to evaluate the roles of control rates of responding and reinforcement in amphetamine's actions. Amphetamine's effects were significantly correlated with both control response rate and control rate of reinforcement. However, by comparison, control response rate was the better predictor of amphetamine behavioral effects. The results support the rate dependency hypothesis that control rate of responding is closely associated with amphetamine's effects on operant behavior.