An operant arena for rats

A multiunit operant arena for the study of dispersion patterns in rats is described. Lawful relationships between the spatiotemporal organization of the group and reinforcement schedules have been found. The scientific and humanistic advantages of the system are discussed.     

Design decisions in a Pascal-based operant conditioning system

FREDL, a Pascal-based system for control of operant experiments, has been implemented on the IBM PC computer. In the foreground, recurring operations, such as decrementing counters that serve as local clocks, are controlled by a dictionary specifying automatic properties of user defined variables, and random logic is implemented by a user-written Pascal overlay. In the background, the remainder of the program controls communication with the user, output of data to disk, and production of cumulative records.     

The MED-PC experimental apparatus programming system

MED-PC is a software system that implements the MEDSTATE NOTATION dialect of state notation on IBM PC and compatible computers equipped with MED Associates interfacing. It provides a programming environment in which users can write short programs in a specialized language to control and record the events of operant and classical conditioning experiments. As many as eight experimental stations, each with up to 8 inputs and 32 outputs, running the same or different experimental procedures, may be active simultaneously. The system provides a standard set of run-time features, including mechanisms for displaying real-time data, simulation of responses, manipulation of array and variable contents, and writing of disk files. The system is based upon polling techniques, and is implemented as a translator that generates Pascal units, which are then linked to previously compiled Pascal routines.     

Sensory Extinction: A procedure for eliminating self-stimulatory behavior in developmentally disabled children

This study was designed to investigate the role of sensory reinforcement in the motivation of self-stimulation. If self-stimulatory behavior is maintained by its sensory consequences, such as the proprioceptive, auditory, or visual stimulation it produces, then such behavior should extinguish when those sensory consequences are not permitted. The present study introduces a new procedure, Sensory Extinction, in which certain sensory consequences are masked or removed, to examine whether self-stimulation is operant behavior maintained by sensory reinforcement. The effectiveness of Sensory Extinction was assessed by a reversal design for each of three autistic children, and the results showed the following. First, self-stimulation reliably extinguished when a certain sensory consequence was removed, then increased when that consequence was permitted. This was replicable within and across children. Second, different Sensory Extinction procedures were required for different self-stimulatory behaviors, since the sensory reinforcers supporting them were idiosyncratic across children. Finally, regarding clinical gains, the data suggest that Sensory Extinction may be a relatively convenient and rapid alternative for the treatment of self-stimulation. The present findings extend the efficacy of extinction as a behavior-modification technique to instances in which the reinforcer is purely sensory. The implications of these results for the treatment of other forms of deviant behavior are discussed.     

CORE: Computer-controlled operant reinforcement

A Pascal-based system and software is described for computer reinforcement of operant responding (CORE). CORE allows a single microcomputer to control up to eight different work stations simultaneously, on one of several schedules. The user need not be familiar with Pascal, although modifications of the programs require a good working knowledge. The system is menu-driven and interacts with the user in a question-and-answer format. The user can select a variety of experimental parameters, for example, session and reinforcement duration, delay, and type of reinforcement schedule. During run-time, CORE provides frequently updated on-screen graphics (Cumulative Records or Interresponse Time Distributions) and counter display. Permanently stored data and information from other counters may also be displayed or printed from the disk. Presently, three programs are implemented for a variety of related reinforcement schedules (e.g., fixed ratio, variable ratio, fixed interval, variable interval, alternation).     

Autonomic learning

Academic achievement was resolved into its intellectual and motivational components. IQ, personality variables, and parameters of operant and classical conditioning of autonomic nervous system controlled variables were examined in 99 black inner-city high school seniors. Six physiological variables(respiration, heart rate, finger plethysmogram, frontalis muscle potential, palmar skin conductance, and palmar skin potential) were analyzed by computer using analog-to-digital conversion and a Points of Interest (PI) program. Psychological measures were full WAIS IQ, Edwards Personality Inventory(EPI), Cattell Sixteen Personality Factor Questionnaire(16PF), McClelland need Achievement test(n Ach), Object Sorting test, Minnesota Counseling Inventory(MCI), Level of Aspiration Board, and Rotter—Miller Locus of Control. Achievement(Ach) was defined as the residuals of total grade point average(GPA) regressed on IQ. Each of 19 variables which discriminated significantly between high and low achievers was employed in step-wise regression analyses for GPA and Ach separately. In a regression analysis of variance of GPA, IQ=20.44%, EPI=9.08%, and physiological measures =21.37%(operant conditioning =18.70%; classical conditioning =2.67%). Combined measures of motivation(psychological and physiological) =30.45% of the variance in GPA. The entire psychological and physiological test battery, including IQ, contributed a total of 50.89% of the variance in GPA. In a regression analysis of variance in achievement, psychological measures, other than IQ(six EPI and one 16PF), =11.0% and physiological measures =30.3%. As a replication, this study demonstrated significant correlation between autonomic conditioning and school achievement.     

Sensorimotor EEG operant conditioning: Experimental and clinical effects

Neurophysiological studies in cats have established a functional relationship between waking 12–15 Hz sensorimotor cortex rhythmic EEG activity (the sensorimotor rhythm or SMR) and a similar pattern during sleep, the sleep spindle. Both result from oscillatory thalamocortical discharge involving ventrobasal thalamus and sensorimotor cortex, and both are associated with a state of suppressed motor excitability. Enhancement of the SMR with operant conditioning methods in the cat clearly led to reduced seizure susceptibility. The experimental application of this approach to seizure control in epileptics has resulted in (A) evidence that EEG patterns can be manipulated significantly in man with operant conditioning, (B) suggestive observations concerning a potential component of pathology in epilepsy, and (C) strong preliminary evidence that SMR operant conditioning in epileptics is specifically therapeutic. Current research has focused upon the EEG during sleep in epileptics with primary motor symptomatology. This measure often reveals several hard signs of pathology. These include the presence of abnormal activity in the 4–7 Hz frequency band and the absence or disturbance of activity in the 11–15 Hz frequency band. Power spectral analysis is being utilized to quantify these sleep EEG components in five groups of epileptic patients, studied with different frequency patterns rewarded in an A-B-A design which provides for counterbalancing of order effects. Initial laboratory training is followed by 9–12 months of training at home with portable feedback equipment. Reward contingencies are reversed within each group at approximately three month intervals. Clinical EEG data, blood anticonvulsant measures and patient seizure logs supplement sleep EEG data obtained before training and after each phase of the design. Early results have again indicated specific therapeutic benefits following training of high frequency rhythmic central cortical activity.     

Water deprivation associated with operant conditioning inhibits hypertensive disease in young spontaneously hypertensive rats

The development of high blood pressure in young spontaneously hypertensive rats (SHR) is inhibited by operant conditioning motivated by chronic water deprivation. The present study showed that the inhibition of hypertension was not due to the operant conditioning,per se, but was a result of chronic water deprivation (23.5 hr schedule) imposed on the rats from five through 12 weeks of age. Blood pressures were measured directly using a carotid artery cannula and light enflurane anesthesia. The behaviorally conditioned SHR and the water-deprived SHR controls had equal blood pressures and were significantly less hypertensive than untreated or enriched environment SHR groups. The antihypertensive action of water deprivation was not detected by weekly indirect blood pressure measurements made in the awake state. Nonetheless, the chronicity of the deprivation-induced inhibition of hypertension was confirmed by a lesser degree of left ventricular hypertrophy in the deprived SHR relative to the nondeprived SHR. Our behavioral results again demonstrated hyperreactivity in the SHR relative to the Wistar Kyoto (WKY). This behavioral hyperreactivity in the SHR may explain the exaggerated increase in drinking in the deprived SHR groups when returned toad lib conditions. The data of this study and our previous work suggest that arousal differences between SHR and WKY strains are more reliably differentiated by fixed interval schedules of reinforcement than by a fixed ratio schedule. Hyperarousal may precede hypertension in the SHR, but it is undetermined whether hypertension can be found in the absence of hyperarousal in these rats.     

Pavloviana inPsychology of the 20th Century: A special review

In the encyclopedicPsychology of the 20th Century three volumes are relevant to the work of I. P. Pavlov, his predecessors, contemporaries, and followers. Volume 1 (1976) provides an extensive account of the history of non-introspective, “objective” psychology. In Volume 4 (1977), examined in this review and consisting of sections on “Theories of Learning” and “Behavior Modification,” separate chapters are devoted to Pavlov’s life and work, and its continuation in the Soviet Union. Classical conditioning is considered in the context of S-R learning theories, interaction with operant conditioning, and development of behavior therapy. Additional materials are likely to be presented in Volume 6 (to be published) dealing with animal psychology, ethology, and physiological psychology.     

Sinusoidal plucks and bows are not categorically perceived,either

Cutting and Rosner (Perception & Psychophysics, 1974,16, 564–570) reported that two acoustic nonspeech continua varying in rise time were categorically perceived. We have already shown (Rosen & Howell,Perception & Psychophysics, 1981,30, 156–168) that the reason their sawtooth continuum was perceived in such a way, and in particular why it exhibited a midcontinuum peak in the discrimination function, was entirely due to the stimuli not having the intended rise times. The other nonspeech continuum that varied in rise time and was reported to be categorically perceived used a sinusoidal carrier. Although the labeling functions obtained were not as sharp as those obtained with sawtooth stimuli, the characteristic midcontinuum discrimination peak was found. We generated such a set of sinusoidal stimuli and found no evidence of categorical perception. Just as we have previously found for sawtooth stimuli, discrimination is best at the short rise-time end of the continuum and decreases monotonically with increasing rise time.     

Meeting novel experimental needs with an Apple Pascal controlled interfacing system

In this article, we describe how to combine an inexpensive interface with an independent timing card to solve some common timing and programming problems. Problems were encountered when we tried, by modifying commercial software, to create novel programs that would accurately control events in our operant conditioning chambers. The solution was to combine a Life Science Associates (LSA) Apple Interfacing System with an Applied Engineering Timemaster II H.O. timing card. Three aspects of the solution are described: (1) LSA’s interfacing hardware; (2) the Timemaster II H.O. timing card; and (3) the Pascal commands necessary to access the timing card. An example, a program to control a concurrent variable-interval schedule, shows how the timing card is used in conjunction with the interface to control and monitor experiments. The system offers many advantages over earlier researcher-built approaches and provides a flexible, accurate, and inexpensive alternative to commercial systems.     

Improving Outcomes for Youth with ADHD: A Conceptual Framework for Combined Neurocognitive and Skill-Based Treatment Approaches

Attention-deficit/hyperactivity disorder (ADHD) is a prevalent and chronic mental health condition that often results in substantial impairments throughout life. Although evidence-based pharmacological and psychosocial treatments exist for ADHD, effects of these treatments are acute, do not typically generalize into non-treated settings, rarely sustain over time, and insufficiently affect key areas of functional impairment (i.e., family, social, and academic functioning) and executive functioning. The limitations of current evidence-based treatments may be due to the inability of these treatments to address underlying neurocognitive deficits that are related to the symptoms of ADHD and associated areas of functional impairment. Although efforts have been made to directly target the underlying neurocognitive deficits of ADHD, extant neurocognitive interventions have shown limited efficacy, possibly due to misspecification of training targets and inadequate potency. We argue herein that despite these limitations, next-generation neurocognitive training programs that more precisely and potently target neurocognitive deficits may lead to optimal outcomes when used in combination with specific skill-based psychosocial treatments for ADHD. We discuss the rationale for such a combined treatment approach, prominent examples of this combined treatment approach for other mental health disorders, and potential combined treatment approaches for pediatric ADHD. Finally, we conclude with directions for future research necessary to develop a combined neurocognitive + skill-based treatment for youth with ADHD.     

Comparison of Peabody,Leiter, WISC,and academic achievement scores among emotionally disturbed children

The present study examined the utility of employing tests such as the PPVT and the AALIPS as viable alternatives to the WISC in the prediction of academic achievement with emotionally disturbed children. The three IQ instruments and the California Achievement Test were administered to a group of 50 male emotionally disturbed children. Intercorrelations among the three tests were all significant and all three successfully predicted academic achievement. However, both the PPVT and the AALIPS consistently resulted in higher IQ estimates than did the WISC. Results supported the use of the PPVT and the AALIPS as equally viable alternatives to the more comprehensive WISC.     

Subject differences in cross-modality matching

Forty-eight Ss performed four tasks each: (1) magnitude estimation of area, (2) magnitude estimation of numerousness, (3) cross-modality matching of force of handgrip to area, and (4) cross-modality matching of force of handgrip to numerousness. An additional 48 Ss performed Tasks 2 and 4. Psychophysical power functions were fitted to the data of each S for each condition. Higher correlations between individual exponents were found for conditions employing a common response (i.e., estimating or squeezing) than were found for conditions with the same set of stimuli. Individual differences among exponents stem more from the idiosyncratic use of the dependent variable than from different sensory characteristics.     

Parenting Adolescents: Examining the Factor Structure of the Alabama Parenting Questionnaire for Adolescents

The Alabama Parenting Questionnaire (APQ) is a well studied assessment of parenting practices for school-age children, especially in relation to child externalizing behaviors. Given the developmental changes between school-age children and adolescents and subsequent changes to parenting approaches during that time, the utility of a public-accessed measure to span across a broad age range is of high clinical and empirical importance. This study investigated the psychometric properties of the APQ in a community sample of 376 parents of adolescents. In an Exploratory Factor Analysis the data suggested a 4-factor solution similar in composition to the original 5-factor model. Proposed factors for the APQ when given to parents of adolescents included Positive and Involved Parenting, Parental Monitoring, Discipline Practices, and Discipline Process.     

The personal and marital adjustment of parents as related to observed child deviance and parenting behaviors

The purpose of this study was to document the relationship of parents' personal and marital adjustment to their own behavior as parents and the behavior of their children. A total of 31 families who had been referred for behavioral counseling regarding their male child's behavior problems were given a diagnostic battery which included home observations as well as administration to parents of the Minnesota Multiphasic Personality Inventory (MMPI) and the LockeWallace Marital Adjustment Test. Results revealed consistent negative relationships between marital satisfaction and the observed level of child deviance. Similarly, there were consistent negative relationships between marital satisfaction and the level of observed “negativeness” to the child. Analyses using the MMPI indicated that a large number of the fathers ' MMPI scales were related to child deviance, but this finding was not replicated for mothers. Several MMPI scales were related to marital satisfaction for both parents. These results are discussed in terms of their implications for the assessment and treatment of families with a problem child.     

Extended Analysis of Empirical Citations with Skinner's Verbal Behavior: 1984-2004

The present paper comments on and extends the citation analysis of verbal operant publications based on Skinner''s Verbal Behavior (1957) by Dymond, O''Hora, Whelan, and O''Donovan (2006). Variations in population parameters were evaluated for only those studies that Dymond et al. categorized as empirical. Preliminary results indicate that the majority of empirical research in the area of verbal behavior has been conducted with the younger developmentally disabled population and has focused on verbal operants from the introductory chapters of Skinner''s book. It is clear that Verbal Behavior has influenced empirical research over the past 50 years. We believe, however, that there are many underdeveloped research areas originating from Verbal Behavior that have not yet been addressed. Suggestions for extended areas of research are provided.     

You Can’t Drink a Word: Lexical and Individual Emotionality Affect Subjective Familiarity Judgments

For almost 30 years, subjective familiarity has been used in psycholinguistics as an explanatory variable, allegedly able to explain many phenomena that have no other obvious explanation (Gernsbacher in J Exp Psychol General 113:256–281, 1984). In this paper, the hypothesis tested is that the subjective familiarity of words is reflecting personal familiarity with or importance of the referents of words. Using an empirically-grounded model of affective force derived from Wundt (Grundriss der Psychologie [Outlines of Psychology]. Engelmann, Leibzig, 1896) and based in a co-occurrence model of semantics (which involves no human judgment), it is shown that affective force can account for the same variance in a large set of human subjective familiarity judgments as other human subjective familiarity judgments, can predict whether people will rate new words of the same objective frequency as more or less familiar, can predict lexical access as well as human subjective familiarity judgments do, and has a predicted relationship to age of acquisition norms. Individuals who have highly affective reactivity [as measured by Carver and White’s (J Pers Soc Psychol 67(2):319–333, 1994) Behavioral Inhibition Scale and Behavioral Activation Scales] rate words as significantly more familiar than individuals who have low affective reactivity.     

Aristotle and Confucius on the Socioeconomics of Shame

The sociopolitical significance Aristotle and Confucius attribute to possessing a sense of shame serves to emphasize the importance of its development. Aristotle maintains that social class and wealth are prerequisites for its acquisition, while Confucius is optimistic that it can be developed regardless of socioeconomic considerations. The difference between their positions is largely due to competing views of praiseworthy dispositions. While Aristotle conceives of praiseworthy dispositions as “consistent” traits of character, traits that calcifiy as one reaches adulthood, Confucius offers us an alternative picture, one that affords a greater plasticity to praiseworthy dispositions by treating them as situational character traits. I argue that the Confucian conception of praiseworthy dispositions, combined with several strategies for developing a sense of shame discussed in the Analects, renders Confucius’s optimism defensible.