Pavlovian and instrumental determinants of response suppression in the pigeon.

Exp I demonstrated the formation of a discriminated punishment effect in the absence of a conditioned emotional response. Electric shocks were delivered at random intervals to 3 naive male White Carneaux pigeons pecking for food on a variable-interval schedule. During a 1-min visual conditioned stimulus (CS), scheduled shocks were delayed until a response occurred (punishment). Differential suppression to the CS was observed in addition to overall suppression. Suppression was related to shock intensity. In Exp II with the same Ss, CS suppression was related to the CS and was not an artifact of response pattern or discrimination of shock patterns. The punishment contingency without the CS did not suppress behavior, and the CS without the punishment contingency did not relieve suppression. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Effects of social class, moral orientation, and severity of punishment on boys' moral responses to transgression and generosity.

In 2 experiments with a total of 128 2nd- and 3rd-grade boys, the effects of social class, moral orientation, and severity of punishment on moral responses to transgression and generosity were investigated. In Exp I, a modified version of J. Aronfreed's task (see record 1964-02542-001), the response measures were the self-critical and reparative responses on the transgression trial, the self-critical responses prior to this trial, and the number of candies removed by the S during the task. In Exp II, the S was asked if he wished to donate any of his candy from Exp I to a "needy" child. Results indicate a differential effect of punishment treatment on the responses of the various moral orientation Ss. The flexible moral orientation Ss punished themselves less and donated more candy than the rigid Ss across the punishment conditions. The data suggest that the flexible moral orientation Ss may be more "mature" and "internalized" than the rigid orientation Ss. (30 ref) (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Suppression of visible persistence.

Five experiments with the 1st author and 3 college students examined the duration of visible persistence in sequences of stimuli. In Exps I and II, the basic display consisted of a point that stepped around a circular path on the face of an oscilloscope. Ss estimated the number of points seen simultaneously. Results were compared with a control condition (Exp III), in which the points were plotted in random order rather than sequentially. Exp IV replicated Exps I and III at 4 additional eccentricities; Exp V examined whether reasonable fixation could be maintained with the larger displays and how a tendency to track the moving point would affect the number of points seen simultaneously. It was found that visible persistence of a point was suppressed if other points were shown nearby and after an appropriate delay. The degree of suppression depended on the spatial proximity of successive points. It was also found that both duration of visible persistence and degree of suppression increased with eccentricity in the visual field. Results are discussed in terms of 2 independent processes, persistence and suppression, that operate in a hierarchically antithetical relation. (25 ref) (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Experimental evaluation of binary pure-tone auditory displays.

The frequency, intensity, duration, and interaural difference (direction) dimensions of pure tone were evaluated singly and in combination at 3 comparable levels of discriminability in order to determine their relative effectiveness as binary curing stimuli for an instrument monitoring task. The use of such signals decreased search time and reduced (Ss') tendencies to be differentially attentive to the various sectors of the information display. No further reduction in search time occurred with 3- and 4-dimensional displays than with 2-dimensional displays. Frequency proved to be the most effective dimension for purposes of cuing. Intensity was least effective. Direction and Duration were of moderate effectiveness. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Identification and localization in tachistoscopic recognition: The effects of data- and resource-limitations.

Examined the effects of data- and resource-limits on mislocation and intrusion errors in a visual probe task. Mislocation errors were defined as responses to any letter that appeared in the test display but not in the position cued; intrusions were responses with letters that did not appear in the test display. Ss were 42 undergraduates with normal vision. Exp I manipulated the data-limits by changing both luminance and duration, and confirmed that decreasing stimulus energy increases intrusions and decreases the benefit of selective attention instructions. Exps II and III manipulated resource-limits by varying display size and the size of a defined subset of a display and showed that this manipulation primarily affected mislocation errors. Exp IV tested a minor point pertaining to the cue used in the previous studies. Results suggest that these errors may reflect 2 different processing operations, and that complete recognition of any visual stimulus involves both processes. (French abstract) (38 ref) (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Age-related deficits in acquisition of a passive avoidance response.

In Exp. I, 80 male albino rats 10, 15, 20, 30, or 100 days old received a brief inescapable shock contingent upon making a step-off response. Step-off latencies increased for all age groups, but rate of learning was significantly faster in older Ss. Learning appeared to be based primarily upon punishment effects rather than general emotionality, since yoked Ss shocked after being placed directly on the grids did not acquire the avoidance response. Exp. II with 120 Ss employed 3 training conditions with independent groups 12, 15, 18, or 21 days old. The step-off response resulted in shock that was either: (a) escapable; (b) inescapable, 1-sec duration; or (c) inescapable, yoked duration. Younger Ss were again significantly inferior to more mature Ss. Escapable shock improved acquisition at 2 age levels, but the effect appeared to be more related to shock duration than to the response contingency. It is suggested that the requirement of withholding a punished response may represent a category of learning that is especially sensitive to maturational changes. (French summary) (16 ref.) (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Studies of the extinction of avoidance responding through the massing of trials.

Performed 2 experiments in an automated 1-way avoidance box for rats. Exp. I, with 44 Sprague-Dawley female albino rats, was concerned with the effect of shock intensity on the rate of extinction using the massing-of-trials technique during extinction. Most measures of avoidance learning were not affected by shock intensity, and the rate of extinction was also not significantly affected. Exp. II, with 44 Ss similar to those in Exp. I, examined the effect of the duration of the extinction ITI on the rate of extinction. A critical duration is suggested by results. (French summary) (15 ref.) (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Facilitative and suppressive effects of punishment on species-typical aggressive display in Betta splendens.

Determined effects of moderate and intense punishment on aggressive behavior. Following either 15 or 45 massed presentations to a mirror, 35 Siamese fighting fish were punished for aggressive display (gill extension). Intense shock punishment led to complete suppression of the display. Recovery of the display depended on the level of habituation, i.e., only the fish given 15 mirror presentations prior to punishment showed recovery. Given "room" for an increase, a moderate level of punishment led to longer displays. A 2nd experiment with 6 Ss confirmed this latter finding with spaced (daily) blocks of trials. (23 ref.) (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Effect of classical conditioning on an internal clock.

Six experiments with 53 male Charles River rats used a psychophysical choice procedure to study the internal clock used to discriminate duration and to investigate whether this clock is sensitive to the signal value (associative strength) of a stimulus. The experiments involved 2 types of trials: On choice trials, a stimulus lasted a short (e.g., 3-sec) or long (e.g., 12-sec) duration; Ss then chose between 2 levers. The rewarded choice depended on the duration of the stimulus. On conditioning trials, the stimulus used on choice trials was presented, but it ended without food (extinction trials) or with food (pairing trials) regardless of what the S did. The main measure of performance was short bias, defined as accuracy with the short stimulus without a corresponding accuracy with the long stimulus. Exp I showed that extinction trials increased short bias relative to training without conditioning trials or to training with pairing trials. Exps II–VI tested explanations of these results. The same results were found when extinction trials were the same duration as the short stimulus (Exp II), when extinction trials were a random duration (Exp V), and when the signal value of the CS was changed in another way (Exp VI). The effect of conditioning trials was modality specific (Exps III and IV). It is concluded that, of the explanations considered, the most valid is that changing the signal value of a stimulus changes how the clock times the stimulus. Reducing signal value reduces the measured duration. (54 ref) (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2011 APA, all rights reserved)     

Re-examination of residual arousal as an explanation of aftereffects: Frustration tolerance versus response speed.

Three experiments, with 98 undergraduates, investigated the effects of increasing task difficulty and noise intensity on postnoise persistence on the Feather tolerance for frustration puzzles. In Exp I, greater persistence occurred both after exposure to moderate noise levels (55 db [A]) and an easy perceptual-motor task and after high noise levels (90 db [A]) and a more difficult task. The same pattern of persistence was obtained in Exp II, with more attempts to solve the Feather puzzles occurring after moderate noise and an easy cognitive task and after loud noise and a more difficult cognitive task. In Exp III, a modified Feather task was presented with instructions to determine solvability. A similar U-shaped relationship was obtained, with longer correct response times to unsolvable puzzles following low noise and high noise. Such aftereffect patterns are more easily explained as the result of residual arousal than of frustration tolerance. (21 ref) (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Differential roles of frequency and meaningfulness in free recall.

Performed 2 experiments with 91 experimentally naive high school students to study the comparative influence of frequency and meaningfulness (m) on free recall. In Exp. I, the free-recall scores of 3 lists of words matched for m but varying in frequency levels were compared. In Exp. II, free recall of 3 lists of words matched for their frequency but varying in their m values were compared. Findings reveal that it is the frequency and not m of the words that influences free-recall, and that the influence of frequency is noticeable in the early trials of free-recall learning. Findings are discussed in terms of the existing theories of verbal learning. (French summary) (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Effects of US duration on classical conditioning of the rabbit's nictitating membrane response.

Attempted to distinguish the effects of UCS duration based on explicit pairings with the CS from the consequences of sheer exposure to the UCS in the rabbit nictitating membrane response. 228 albino rabbits received various proportions of CS (a 1,000-Hz tone) and UCS (a 60-Hz shock). Exp I revealed that there was an inverse relation between the overall level of CR acquisition and UCS durations of 50, l,500, and 6,000 msec. In addition, decrements in CR likelihood occurred within the daily sessions of 90 CS–UCS trials, and the magnitude of these within-session decrements was directly related to UCS duration. In Exp II, UCS duration of 50 and 6,000 msec were paired with the CS. When UCS exposure was equated, the UCS duration paired with the CS had a positive effect on CR likelihood. Conversely, in Exp III, the duration of interpolated UCSs had inverse effects on the rate of CR acquisition. In Exp IV, the opportunity for within-session decrements was eliminated by presenting only 1 CS–UCS trial per day, which resulted in a positive relation between CR likelihood and UCS duration. Results are discussed in terms of associative and performance hypotheses. (54 ref) (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Object continuity in apparent motion and attention.

Presents 2 experiments that show that the continuity property may underlie 2 seemingly unrelated perceptual phenomena: attentional capture by abrupt visual onset and the appearance of bistable apparent motion displays. In Exp 1, 30 Ss reported the appearance of a bistable apparent-motion (or Ternus) display and engaged in visual search for a prespecified target; on each trial 1 element was briefly flickered off and back on. The time course of the gap duration effect in the visual search task was very similar to that for the Ternus display. In Exp 2, with 15 Ss, the possibility that the presence of an abrupt offset caused the results of Exp 1 was ruled out, since the reactions times (RTs) for the single- and double-offset conditions were similar. Results suggest that the interruption of spatiotemporal continuity may be the underlying mechanism that produces these 2 seemingly unrelated perceptual phenomena. (French abstract) (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Determinants of word translation.

Three experiments looked for the determinants of performance in 3 versions of the word-translation task. Exp 1 contained the normal-translation version and the cued-translation version. In Exp 2, Ss performed the translation-recognition task. In both experiments, word frequency and word imageability were manipulated. Both affected performance in all 3 versions of the task. In Exp 3 (normal translation), in addition to the effects of frequency and imageability, those of context availability, cognate status, definition accuracy, length of the stimulus words and of their translations, and familiarity were studied. All of them correlated with the performance measures, but only 4 variables accounted for unique translation variance: the frequency of the stimulus word, the frequency of the response word, cognate status, and context availability. These results are discussed in terms of bilingual memory structure. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Word familiarity and frequency in visual and auditory word recognition.

Four experiments investigated printed word frequency and subjective rated familiarity. Words of varied printed frequency and subjective familiarity were presented. A reaction time (RT) advantage for high-familiarity and high-frequency words was found in visual (Exp 1) and auditory (Exp 2) lexical decision. In Exps 3 and 4, a cued naming task elicited a naming response after a specified delay after presentation. In Exp 3, naming of visual words showed a frequency effect with no naming delay. The frequency effect diminished at longer delay intervals. Naming times for auditorily presented words (Exp 4) showed no frequency effect at any delay. Both naming experiments showed familiarity effects. The relevance of these results are discussed in terms of the role of printed frequency for theories of lexical access, task- and modality-specific effects, and the nature of subjective familiarity. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2011 APA, all rights reserved)     

Effects of coital stimulation upon behavior of the female rat.

Tested the importance of vagino-cervical stimulation during coitus in 2 experiments, using 16 intact and 48 ovariectomized Sprague-Dawley female rats, in which intromission was prevented by a vaginal mask. The behavior of Ss was compared to that of unmasked females. Behavioral indices included lordosis quotient, a measure of sexual responsiveness, and rejection quotient, a measure of social response toward the males. The rating of lordosis intensity on a 3-point scale provided a mean lordosis intensity. Exp. I investigated long-term effects of coital stimulation by repeated testing of Ss in natural and hormone-induced heat. Coital stimulation generally decreased the probability of subsequent lordosis and increased display of rejection. Exp. II studied the short-term effects of coital stimulation using single 50-mount tests. Coital stimulation decreased intensity as well as probability of subsequent lordosis. (23 ref.) (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Generality of the interaction model of anxiety with respect to two social evaluation field studies.

Hypothesized that Ss high in social evaluation trait anxiety (TA) would experience significantly greater changes (i.e., between stress and nonstress conditions) in TA than Ss low in social evaluation TA. It was further predicted that for the noncongruent interpersonal, physical danger, ambiguous, and innocuous TA dimensions, TA changes experienced by Ss high and low in TA would not differ significantly. 26 high school students (Exp I) and 28 24–60 yr old middle management corporate executives (Exp II) were administered the S-R Inventory of General Trait Anxiousness, the Present Affect Reactions Questionnaire, and the Perception of Situations Rating form under stressful (examination situation [Exp I] and on-the-job situation oriented toward achievement and performance [Exp II]) and nonstressful conditions. While the predicted relationships between TA, state anxiety (SA), and situation stress were confirmed, results provide only moderate support for the interaction model of anxiety because Ss did not strongly endorse the initial assumption that the stressful situations would be perceived as primarily socially evaluative. The apparent discrepancy between situation perception and SA levels of Ss high and low in social evaluation TA is discussed in terms of differential responsiveness to trait-congruent situational elements within various TA groups. (French abstract) (16 ref) (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Stimulus intensity in sensory preconditioning of rats.

Examined the sensory preconditioning (SPC) analogs to UCS and CS intensity in 2 experiments with male hooded rats (N= 144). In Exp. I, Ss received S1-S2 (light and tone, counterbalanced) pairings with 1 of 3 different intensities of S2, followed by conditioned emotional response (CER) training to S2. Suppression of drinking by S1 (SPC groups) and S2 (CER groups) was tested. Amount of SPC was not significantly affected by S2 intensity, but the strength of the CER was an increasing function of S2 (CS) intensity. In Exp. II, amount of SPC was a monotonically increasing function of S1 intensity. Results are interpreted in terms of the similarities and differences between SPC and classical conditioning. (French summary) (16 ref.) (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Impairment of reversal learning in the rat: A mediational explanation.

Examined the finding that reversal learning is impaired when rats are both punished and rewarded for incorrect responses. In Exp. I with 40 male Holtzman rats, it was found that (a) it was necessary for punishment and reward to be administered during both original and reversal learning for such impairment to occur; (b) similar but weaker impairment occurred when nonreward was administered during both original and reversal learning; and (c) reversal learning occurred most rapidly when the consequence of an error (punishment or nonreward) was switched between training and reversal. It is suggested that reversal learning reinstated the emotional state present during original learning and that impairment occurred because the associations formed to that state in training interfered with the behavior required during reversal. Exp. II with 22 Ss confirmed predictions from this hypothesis. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)