The legacy of Guttman and Kalish (1956): Twenty-five years of research on stimulus generalization

This paper is a selective review of the methods, problems, and findings in the area of operant stimulus generalization over the 25 years since the publication of the original paper by Guttman and Kalish (1956) on discriminability and spectral generalization in the pigeon. The paper falls into five main sections, which encompass the main themes and problems stemming from the Guttman and Kalish work and its immediate successors. The first section addresses the relationship between stimulus generalization and stimulus control, as well as the variety of testing procedures and dependent variables used to measure generalization. The next section reviews the limited literature on the effects of early rearing on the generalization gradient. The relationship between discriminability among test stimuli and the slope of the spectral gradient is discussed in the third section, with emphasis upon recent reassessments of the pigeon's hue discriminability function. The fourth section reviews the topic of inhibitory stimulus control, one which developed with the discovery of the peak shift following intradimensional discrimination training. Problems of definition and measurement are discussed in conjunction with the gradient forms used to index inhibitory control. The last section is devoted to attentional effects and the two principal theories postulated to account for them. A survey of different attentional paradigms is provided and the possible role of constant irrelevant stimuli as a source of control is examined. A brief conclusion summarizes the contribution of the generalization technique toward an understanding of the nature and acquisition of stimulus control.     

GENERALIZATION OF THE EFFECTS OF TEACHER- AND SELF-ADMINISTERED TOKEN REINFORCERS TO NONTREATED STUDENTS

Ten, black, second-grade boys served in a series of single-subject studies. They were from poor families, did not do well in arithmetic, were deficient in sustained attention, and presented behavior problems at school. One boy was a therapeutic confederate. Of the remaining nine nontreated students, three observed the confederate reinforced by a teacher, three observed the confederate self-reinforce without having an opportunity to use “self-reinforcement” themselves, and three observed self-reinforcement while having an opportunity to use “self-reinforcement.” The target behavior was attending. Other measures of outcome were glancing, academic achievement, and accuracy of reinforcement. The basic experimental design consisted of an ABAB withdrawal applied to the confederate while the nontreated students remained on baseline. Generalization was expressed as a ratio (i.e., percent change in the generalization measure divided by percent change in the target behavior). Teacher-administered reinforcers to the confederate did not produce generalization of any kind. Both arrangements of self-administered reinforcers to the confederate produced across-subjects generalization and subject-response generalization. Additionally, the confederate manifested response generalization.     

IMPROVING CLASSROOM BEHAVIOR IN MENTALLY RETARDED CHILDREN THROUGH CORRESPONDENCE TRAINING

Except for a few studies, most research investigating correspondence training procedures has been more analogue in nature. The purpose of the present set of studies was to examine whether a “say-do” correspondence training technique could be used with children in special education classes to improve classroom behavior. The specific behaviors targeted for change included: out-of-seat behavior (Experiment 1), sitting posture (Experiment 2), and on-task behavior (Experiment 3). The say-do procedure used in Experiment 1 resembled that of previous studies, whereas that in Experiment 2 was more elaborate in the specificity of verbal statements required from the children and the feedback given them. The training procedure in Experiment 3 used a format similar to the say-do approach, but stressed visual rather than verbal cuing because it was used with nonverbal children. All three studies used single-subject designs and examined maintenance and/or generalization questions. Experiments 2 and 3 also evaluated whether concomitant changes in performance on academic tasks occurred. The results of the three studies provide strong evidence that correspondence training can be effectively used with educationally handicapped children. Moreover, the successful modification of the “say-do” to a “show-do” procedure in Experiment 3 points out the flexibility of the correspondence training approach.     

TRAINING AND GENERALIZATION OF LAUNDRY SKILLS: A MULTIPLE PROBE EVALUATION WITH HANDICAPPED PERSONS

An instructional procedure composed of a graded sequence of prompts and token reinforcement was used to train a complex chain of behaviors which included sorting, washing, and drying clothes. A multiple probe design with sequential instruction across seven major components of the laundering routine was used to demonstrate experimental control. Students were taught to launder clothing using machines located in their school and generalization was assessed later on machines located in the public laundromat. A comparison of students' laundry skills with those of normal peers indicated similar levels of proficiency. Follow-up probes demonstrated maintenance of laundry skills over a 10-month period.     

A comparison of severalk sample tests for ordered alternatives in completely randomized designs

The importance of appropriate test selection for a given research endeavor cannot be over-emphasized. Using samples drawn from eleven populations (differing in shape, peakedness, and density in the tails), this study investigates the small sample empirical powers of ninek-sample tests against ordered location alternatives under completely randomized designs. The results then are intended to aid the researcher in the selection of a particular procedure appropriate for a given endeavor. To highlight this an industrial psychology application involving work productivity is presented.Research was supported in part by the Scholastic Assistance Program, Baruch College. The author wishes to thank Professors Matthew Goldstein, Shulamith Gross, David Levine, and Edward Wolf for their helpful comments when writing this paper. In addition, the author wishes to thank the referees and editor for their useful suggestions for improving the paper.     

On testing the equality of proportions in the paired case with incomplete data

The problem of testing two correlated proportions with incomplete data is considered by means of Monte Carlo simulations studies. A test proposed in this paper, which can be regarded as a generalization of McNemar's test, is recommended in all cases with incomplete data and not too small samples.     

THE NEGATIVE SIDE EFFECTS OF REWARD

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.     

ACQUISITION OF SIGN LANGUAGE BY AUTISTIC CHILDREN II: SPONTANEITY AND GENERALIZATION EFFECTS

Autistic children typically do not use their language repertoire in order to communicate. Six autistic children who exhibited poor communication skills were trained to use their sign repertoire to make spontaneous requests of adults. Training consisted of imitative prompting, fading, and differential reinforcement, and included aspects of incidental teaching. The children displayed an increase in the rate and variety of spontaneous sign requests (Experiment 1). Generalization of spontaneity across adults (Experiments 1 and 2) and settings (Experiment 2) was also observed. We suggest that spontaneity may be facilitated when language is brought under the control of broadly defined stimuli such as adult attention rather than narrowly defined stimuli such as the presence of specific objects or verbal prompting in the form of questions. Finally, response generalization was observed as well (Experiment 1). Specifically, as spontaneity increased, self-stimulatory behavior decreased. This result may be accounted for in terms of reinforcer competition, reinforcer consistency, or discriminative stimulus effects.     

A new procedure for detection of crossing DIF

The purpose of this paper is to present a hypothesis testing and estimation procedure, Crossing SIBTEST, for detecting crossing DIF. Crossing DIF exists when the difference in the probabilities of a correct answer for the two examinee groups changes signs as ability level is varied. In item response theory terms, crossing DIF is indicated by two crossing item characteristic curves. Our new procedure, denoted as Crossing SIBTEST, first estimates the matching subtest score at which crossing occurs using least squares regression analysis. A Crossing SIBTEST statistic then is used to test the hypothesis of crossing DIF. The performance of Crossing SIBTEST is evaluated in this study.This research was partially supported by a grant from the Law School Admission Council and by National Science Foundation Mathematics Grant NSF-DMS-94-04327. The research reported here is collaborative in every respect and the order of authorship is alphabetical. The authors thank Jeff Douglas and Louis Roussos for their useful comments and discussions.     

A re-examination of the misinformation effect by means of visual and verbal recognition tests

Abstract: Two experiments were carried out to investigate the factors that produce the misinformation effect (Loftus, 1979a). Experiment 1 of the present study using the visual recognition test was a replica of Experiment 1 of Loftus, Miller, and Burns (1978). The misinformation effect was not found. Experiment 2 differed from Experiment 1 in the following respects: the modality of recognition test was varied between visual and verbal; memorableness (ease of memorization) of the critical objects was varied. The results of Experiment 2 suggest that the original visual memory might be more likely to be recovered with a visual recognition test than with a verbal recognition test, and that the postevent information would not necessarily interfere effectively with memory of an original object of too high or low memorableness, while it works well on objects of intermediate memorableness.