Time-series analysis in operant research

A time-series method is presented, nontechnically, for analysis of data generated in individual-subject operant studies, and is recommended as a supplement to visual analysis of behavior change in reversal or multiple-baseline experiments. The method can be used to identify three kinds of statistically significant behavior change: (a) changes in score levels from one experimental phase to another, (b) reliable upward or downward trends in scores, and (c) changes in trends between phases. The detection of, and reliance on, serial dependency (autocorrelation among temporally adjacent scores) in individual-subject behavioral scores is emphasized. Examples of published data from the operant literature are used to illustrate the time-series method.     

SOCIAL-SKILLS TRAINING FOR UNASSERTIVE CHILDREN: A MULTIPLE-BASELINE ANALYSIS1

The effects of social-skills training consisting of instructions, feedback, behavior rehearsal, and modelling were examined in a multiple-baseline analysis in four unassertive children. The treatment was effective in that the behaviors selected for modification changed markedly. The effects of treatment generalized from trained to untrained items (interpersonal situations requiring assertive responding) and gains were maintained at the two- and four-week followup probe sessions. In addition, overall assertiveness in all subjects increased from baseline assessment to the conclusion of treatment and into followup.     

Obsessional-compulsive complaints

A simple questionnaire was developed as an instrument for assessing the existence and extent of different obsessional-compulsive complaints. Two major types of complaint, checking and washing compulsions, and two minor types, slowness and doubting, were established. The final form of the questionnaire, and major properties, are presented.     

Conditioning treatment of enuresis using a 70% intermittent reinforcement schedule

A 70% intermittent variable ratio reinforcement schedule was administered by automated equipment to 80 enuretic children of both sexes. Dryness criterion (14 consecutive dry nights) was reached by 94% of the sample. Mean treatment duration was less than seven weeks. Approximately 80% of the sample recorded at least one multiple wetting night during the early stages of conditioning treatment. Relapse rates varied as a function of age ranging from 5.25% in 7–8 year olds to 50% in 9–10 year olds. For all ages combined, the observed relapse rate of 25% was found to be significantly lower than reported in the enuresis literature over the past 10 years.     

Central progesterone induces female sexual behavior in estrogen-primed intact males rats

Progesterone induced high levels of female lordotic behavior in 10 of 17 intact, estrogen-primed male rats when it was applied directly to the medial preoptic-anterior hypothalamic area. All 17 males previously had shown lordosis when the serotonergic antagonist methysergide was applied to the same central sites. Few males responded to systemic progesterone and none to intracralial cholesterol. Intradiencephalic Metycaine, a local anesthetic, induced lordosis in eight male that previously had responded to central progesterone. These data indicate that estrogen and progesterone act synergistically to induce lordosis in male rats when progesterone is administered directly to sensitive brain sites.     

Transfer of reaction inhibition

A serious challenge to Hull's (1943) theory of reminiscence and intertrial-interval effects is posed by the current contention that reactive inhibition (In) must be task-specific since it does not seem to transfer from one task to another. This notion was examined within the framework of a practice-rest paradigm in which three control groups were given 20 1-min trials on a principal task with intertrial intervals of 0, 5, and 70 sec, respectively, while two experimental groups practiced alternately on the principal task and a secondary task known to produce evidence for I(R). The two secondary tasks varied in their similarities to the principal task. Additional control groups were used to assess the magnitude of habit transfer effects. The total sample consisted of 70 males and 70 females whose modal age was 18 yr. With habit transfer effects controlled, results showed clearly that work effects transferred from the alternate tasks to the main task without regard for differences in similarity. Thus, the task-specificity hypothesis was not supported.     

Serial-position effects in motor short-term memory

This study examined the effect of the length of a series of movements on the recall of those movements. Subjects (n = 45) were randomly assigned to one of three experimental groups with each group recalling either three, six, or nine movements on a linear-slide apparatus. The subjects, while blindfolded, were presented with each movement by actively moving to a stop. Recall occurred 5 sec after the last movement to a stop on a trial. All subjects were given nine trials, each containing a different series of to-be-recalled movements. Results indicated that absolute error of recall of the three movements increased in a linear fashion. However, for six and nine movements, a bowing effect of the recall curve was noted following the fifth position. A primacy effect was more evident than was a recency effect. Accuracy of recall was a function of list length up to six movements, after which accuracy was not further impaired.     

On the ethics of psychological research

Three philosophical positions on the nature of ethics were examined and contrasted within the context of psychological research: (a) teleology, which involves the balancing of the costs and benefits associated with an action as a means of developing general ethical rules; (b) deontology, which involves the rational adherence to rigid, universal rules that hold irrespective of the situation or consequences; and (c) skepticism, which involves denying the ability to apply universal rules and asserting the individuality of moral codes. Two experiments investigated the degree to which judgments of the ethicality of psychological research are affected by the consequences of the research and judge's ethical ideology. Subjects judged experiments that investigated obedience to an authority as generally less moral and more threatening to the participants' dignity and welfare when the proportion of total obedience was high rather than low. The proportion of participants (10 vs 40%) who were described as “psychologically upset” by the research did not affect moral judgments. These results were obtained across two different obedience situations (Milgram's study and a Watergate study) and different subject populations (high school and college students, males and females). As suggested by philosophers, a judge's ethical ideology determined how the perceived benefits and costs of the research were correlated with moral judgments. Teleologists weighed scientific benefits heavily, deontologists weighed participants' costs heavily, and skeptics weighed both heavily.