Return of fear: The role of inhibition

In a previous study investigating the relationship between subjective, physiological and behavioural changes during treatment of specific phobias, a marked between-session increase was found in subjective fear after high, but not after low intensity phobic stimulation although the groups showed similar fear ratings and heart rates immediately after treatment (Grey et al, 1979). It was hypothesized that the high intensity stimulation led to ‘treatment fatigue’; a state of deactivation, the recovery from which led to a return of fear.In this study high intensity in vivo stimulation was used for the treatment of phobic subjects under conditions of distributed and massed practice. No differences emerged between treatment conditions. A small group of Ss with a conspicuously high heart rate (mean level 120 bpm) when rating zero fear, showed a significant increase in fear after one week's interval, although they had shown similar improvement to the Ss during treatment. Subjects in both treatment conditions showed lower heart rate at all post-treatment assessments than pre-treatment. The high initial heart rate Ss continued to have higher heart rate than other Ss throughout the experiment, although they showed a decrease after treatment. It was only these Ss with desynchronously high heart rate, i.e. high heart rate with zero fear ratings, who suffered a return of fear, whereas high heart rate during high fear did not predict either response to treatment or return of fear. A further finding was a lack of correlation between the behavioural and physiological indices of fear, namely, between distance and heart rate at high levels of fear.     

Stimulus hierarchy generalization in systematic desensitization

A group of snake phobic Ss were desensitized to the first 5 items of a standard 7 item snake fear hierarchy in which the items were ordered on the basis of distance from a snake. This group and a no-treatment control group (which did not receive the desensitization) were treated for fear of all the hierarchy stimuli in terms of ratings both before and after the desensitization. The Ss rated their fear responses to all the stimuli as presented to them in (1) real form (2) by slide, and (3) in imaginal form. The results verified all four experimental hypotheses: (1) The experimental Ss showed greater fear reduction than the control Ss to both the training stimuli (the stimuli on which desensitization done) and the generalization stimuli (the other two stimuli), (2) The systematic desensitization (SD) group showed (a) more fear reduction to the last training stimuli than to the lower generalization stimulus and (b) more to the latter than to the higher generalization stimulus, (3) The SD group showed less fear reduction to the generalization stimuli in their real form than in both the slide and imaginai modalities (in the desensitization each stimulus presentation was done first in slide form and then in imaginal form), and (4) There were significant overall individual differences in generalization of fear reduction to the generalization stimuli.     

The generality of word-association hierarchies: I. Production and recall of association responses

Ss responded to a stimuluslist in a free word association session (AS) and tried to recall their response to each stimulus in a recall session (RS). There was a significant positive correlation between commonality score (Co) in AS and number of correct reproductions in RS. All Ss tended to gain in Co, but LC (i.e., Ss of low Co in AS) more than HC (i.e., Ss of high Co in AS).     

Children's acquisition and reversal behavior in a probability learning situation as a function of programed instruction,internal-external control,and schedules of reinforcement

A three-choice, contingent task was used with 192 fifth and sixth graders in a 2 × 2 × 3 factorial design combining instruction (programed instruction on selected probability concepts vs no programed instruction), locus of control (internal vs external), and schedules of reinforcement (33, 66, and 100%). The dependent measures were the percentage of correct acquisition responses, of correct reversal responses, and of pattern responses, as well as posttests on probability concepts. The major findings of the study were associated with schedule of reinforcement. In acquisition and reversal, Ss under 100% reinforcement during acquisition tended to maximize the greatest, followed by the 66 and 33% conditions, in that order. The ordinal relationship among schedules was the exact reverse of the maximizing approach for the pattern responses. A partial reinforcement effect was obtained in reversal. Evidence indicated that programed instruction and locus of control affected maximizing behavior, patterning behavior, and resistance to extinction (though these variables did not interact with reinforcement schedule in the predicted direction). Finally the posttest data showed that instructed Ss did learn more relative to noninstructed Ss.     

Evaluation apprehension and response withholding in solution of anagrams

Sixty male Ss who were classified as high or low scorers on the Sarason Test Anxiety Scale performed a difficult anagrams task either alone, before a passively observing experimenter or in the presence of an experimenter who both observed and evaluated the S's performance. Ss who were high in test anxiety attempted fewer anagrams and had fewer correct solutions in the Evaluated condition than in the Alone condition, but also had a higher proportion of correct solutions out of total attempts. Low test-anxiety Ss did not show variable performance across conditions for any measure. Follow-up studies showed that when Ss were encouraged to attempt partial solutions neither test anxiety nor experimental treatment influenced any of the measures of performance. State anxiety change scores from baseline to post-treatment assessment showed a generally negative correlation between anxiety and number of anagrams attempted. The results indicate that fear of failure engendered by test anxiety and experimenter evaluation caused Ss to withhold responding.     

Cardiac response as an index of the effect of aversion therapy

Recent research shows that aversion conditioning produces conditioned aversions to target stimuli. Conditioned aversions are manifest in the following posttreatment changes in Ss' responses to target stimuli: increased negative evaluations, decreased contact or consumption, and increased phasic heart-rate responses (HRRs). Research on aversion therapy for additive disorders reveals that HRR is a particularly important index of therapeutic change as it is predictive of latency to relapse to drug use. We speculate that aversion conditioning increases Ss' fear and repugnance of target stimuli, that HRRs accurately reflect such defensive responses and that magnitude of defensive response is positively related to latency to relapse. In addition to defensive responding, we believe that HRRs may reflect coping-response or active-avoidance information processing.     

Age related changes in the effectiveness of name and visual codes in recognition memory

In the first of three studies college, third grade, and kindergarten Ss were able to determine that two stimuli presented 700 msec apart were the same more quickly if they were visually identical than if they shared the same name. If 3000 msec elapsed between stimulus presentations third grade and college Ss responded at the same rate in making both types of matches, whereas kindergarten Ss appeared to continue to respond more quickly in making visual matches. Study II was an unsuccessful attempt to replicate the kindergarten finding. A warning signal, presented 500 msec prior to the second stimulus, reduced RTs at both interstimulus intervals, but no significant differences in making visual and name matches occurred. In Study III first-graders, responding either with or without a warning signal, were found to respond like the older Ss in Study I. The warning signal again reduced RT at both intervals. The results suggest that Ss across a wide age range are able to use the visual properties of a stimulus for only a very brief period as the basis for making matching judgments.     

Structural vs. Expressive form in Music

A sample of 128 Ss differing in flying experience were compared in their travel preferences and in their drawings of airplanes. Significant sex differences were found, with males drawing more “realistic” airplanes; and females, larger airplanes. Those males who had flown and who indicated motion in their drawings tended to report some experience of motion sickness. Those females who had flown and who indicated motion in their drawings tended to report fear of high places.     

Instigation of assertive behavior through videotape-mediated assertive models and directed practice

Twenty-eight undergraduate college women received an assertive training procedure in which they observed videotape-mediated assertive models and practiced nine types of assertive responses over a seven-week period. They reported significantly (p< 0.01) more assertive behavior and were rated as significantly (p< 0.01) more assertive than subjects receiving a placebo treatment and subjects receiving no treatment. There were also trends (p's = 0.17, 0.19, 0.29) for Ss receiving assertive training to report lower fear of social conflicts than subjects under the two control conditions.     

Interaction of reinforcement conditions and developmental level in a two-choice discrimination task with children

A total of 540 first, fourth, and eighth graders, equally divided by sex, were run on a two-choice discrimination task under one of three reinforcement conditions: reward (R) for correct responses, punishment (P) for incorrect responses, or reward and punishment (RP) for correct and incorrect responses. Half the Ss were tested by a male E; half, by a female E. Across all developmental levels, learning was superior in the P group. Complex interactions involving sex of S and E underline the importance of organismic variables in discrimination learning and in specifying parameters of reinforcer effectiveness.     

Errorless establishment of visual discrimination using fading procedures

A visual discrimination task involved presenting a triangle briefly as a sample. When it was withdrawn, this triangle and two others differing slightly in degree of rotation were presented in different positions, with S required to locate the sample that had been presented. Discrimination proved difficult for preschool children. When only the correct triangle was illuminated, discrimination was readily established. The brightness difference between correct and incorrect matches was gradually faded out by increasing the intensity of the incorrect matches, until they were equal in brightness to the correct match. The discrimination established by brightness difference was maintained in its absence, thereby transferring stimulus control from brightness to form, in an almost errorless sequence.     

Reinforced practice and reduction of different kinds of fears in adults and children

The purpose of this study was to determine whether or not fears with different origins, course and chronicity could be reduced by a common treatment program. A number of therapeutic procedures that had been experimentally demonstrated to be individually important in prior behavior modification studies with neurotic disorders were combined into a single therapeutic program called ‘reinforced practice.’ The combined elements were: graduated and repeated practice in approaching actual phobic stimuli: reinforcement for gains in performance; feedback of measurable progress; and instructions designed to arouse expectations of gradual success. In each of four experiments involving four different fears, namely fear of heights, snakes and electric shock in adults, and fear of darkness in young children, Ss who expeienced the ‘reinforced practice’ procedure improved their performance by a significant and substantial margin as compared to untreated control Ss. These results suggest that regardless of different etiologies, regardless of whether or not the fears are ‘rational’ or ‘irrational,’ and regardless of whether or not the fears are transitory or long lasting, the same treatment procedure can be equally effective in reducing escape-avoidance behavior.     

Transfer of fear reduction through systematic desensitization

Systematic desensitization therapy involves the presentation of fear-provoking situations through visualization As the visualizations cease to evoke emotional responses, the fear-provoking potential of the real situations decreases. Research has clearly shown that such transfer does indeed occur with a wide variety of fears. Transfer has been demonstrated, for example, with fear of small animals (Lang and Lazovik, 1963), interpersonal performance anxiety (Paul, 1966), classic phobias (Lazarus, 1961), test anxiety (Katahn, Strenger and Cherry, 1966), impotence (Wolpe, 1958) and frigidity (Lazarus, 1963). However, the nature of transfer has received little attention. Wolpe (1963) has claimed that transfer from therapy to the real life situation is almost complete and direct: “There is almost invariably a one-to one relationship between what the patient can imagine without anxiety and what he can experience in reality without anxiety”. This claim has received support from Rachman (1966) who found that fear reduction transferred immediately to the real situation in 82 per cent of his observations. Hoenig and Reed (1966) reported that after a brief delay, transfer effects were observed in the case of words representing fearful stimuli but were inconsistent in the case of the real stimuli. Agras (1967) found transfer to be delayed in all his cases. He further reported that, though all patients improved, a direct relationship between therapeutic progress and symptom reduction was not found. Both Hain et al. (1966) and Meyer and Crisp (1966) have described the failure of therapeutic effects to transfer to real life.These somewhat inconsistent reports may stem in part from the measurement of transfer effects at different times. Another possibility is that more fearful Ss may evidence less transfer than less fearful Ss. Lang and Lazovik (1963) reported that Ss who completed less than 75 per cent of the hierarchy showed little improvement although direct transfer effects were observed for less fearful Ss (those who complete 75 per cent or more hierarchy items). The present study of transfer effects was designed to remove confoundingof level of fear with extent of progress in systematic desensitization.     

Differential reinforcement of low rates performance by impulsive and reflective children

Third-grade boys classified as either cognitively impulsive or reflective were reinforced for key pressing according to a DRL (differential reinforcement of low rates) 6-sec schedule of reinforcement. Half of each group received instructions about the behavioral requirements for obtaining reinforcements. Prior to DRL training, impulsive Ss showed a low probability of key press responding at long interresponse time (IRT) intervals while reflective Ss exhibited an equal probability of terminating either short or long IRTs. During training and in the absence of instructions, impulsives exhibited a less precise temporal discrimination, characterized by a greater predominance of response bursts (0–2 sec IRTs) following reinforcements, than reflective Ss. While impulsive and reflective Ss displayed similar frequencies of collateral behavior between successively reinforced responses, impulsives engaged in the reinforced response more frequently and tended (p < .08) to obtain fewer reinforcements. Instructions served to enhance the DRL performance.     

Extraversion-introversion and heat-stress tolerance

Ten Ss were tested under heat-stress conditions, during which their physiological stress was measured. Before commencement of the experiment, the Ss' level of extraversion was measured, as well as the meaning they assigned to the situation and the subjective probability of success they gave themselves. It was found that extraverts assigned significantly more positive meaning to the heat-stress situation than introverts, and they tended to estimate their probability of success as higher than did the introverts. However, extraverts tended to suffer from higher physiological stress than introverts, where the main cause for that seemed to be their higher expectations resulting from the positive meaning assigned by them to the heat-stress situation.     

Ageing and perceptual problem-solving: A response analysis approach

This study investigates the nature of age-related changes in performance on a perceptual maze test. A clear linear decline in overall level of performance was found in a cross-sectional study of 20- to 70-yr-old Ss. While some of this decline is due to slowing with age, a detailed analysis of specific components of Ss' response pathways also revealed certain qualitative changes. Although there was no significant evidence of reduced look-ahead or planning in the elderly, there was a clear increase in the proportion of straight-line responses and errors. In contrast to the performance of low-scoring younger Ss, the lower scores of older Ss are not due to their making more errors of all types since they show very selective changes in their response strategies on this task.     

A model of three-choice discrimination learning under complete and incomplete feedback conditions

The Bower and Trabasso model of concept identification was extended to cover problems in which three stimuli were presented simultaneously and S pointed to the one he thought was correct. The E gave complete feedback by indicating the correct stimulus, or incomplete feedback by saying “correct” or “wrong.” The model accurately accounted for the significant difference in total errors between the two feedback conditions by incorporating process assumptions reflecting the logical difference in information content of the two types of feedback. Using a single set of parameter estimates, the model made satisfactory quantitative predictions of several statistics for both feedback conditions. Some deviations from the model's predictions were found in the length of terminal error runs, indicating that Ss were possibly using memory more extensively than posited by the model.     

Memory for prenominal adjectives in ordinary English sentences

Ss have been found to remember the gist of English sentences quite well while having little or no memory for structural features unrelated to the basic meaning. This research examines the representation of meaning in memory using adjective-noun phrases embedded in ordinary sentences. Ss studied a long series of sentences and were later tested for memory of certain of the adjectives in these sentences. Tested with a specially constructed forced-choice recognition procedure, Ss made significantly more recognition errors to distractors from the same predicative class as the correct choice than they did to distractors from different classes. This effect was highly significant when the correct choice was a nonpolar adjective but was not different from chance when a polar was correct. Data from a recall test procedure suggested this difference was due to Ss remembering the denotative or referential meaning of the adjective. The results showed that Ss remember abstract aspects of the predicative meaning of adjectival modification.     

Concept identification with natural material.

Phonetic letters in Japanese (Hiragana, 23 in number) written by 6 adults (Ws) were presented one by one and the S was asked to guess by which W it was written. Immediately after the S made the guess, the code of correct W was given on each trial. The Ss were Japanese housewives, students etc., 53 in number. Rate of correct identification increased during 23 × 6 trials, but only from 0.3 to 0.4 on the average. The learning transferred to the remaining 23 letters of the same kind but not to letters of the other kind (Katakana). On each trial, the S verbally described cues upon which the guess was made. When the data were separately analysed according to Ws, it was found that letters of the W who was most difficult to identify were most ‘diffused’ in characterization by the Ss. The relevance of the present experiment to study of concept identification in general was also discussed.