系列范畴词表时序记忆和项目记忆研究

该项研究探讨系列范畴词表的时序长时记忆和项目长时记忆,实验设计的系列范畴词表将记忆项目分为词表内范畴相同项和词表间范畴相同项,时序记记测量方法是词表辨认,项目记忆测量方法是自由回忆。实验一发现：２分钟延缓测试词表内范畴相同项时序记忆和项目记忆优于词表间范畴相同项;６分钟以及１０分钟延缓测试时序记忆仍是词表内范畴相同项好。实验二发现：以范畴线索提取,两类项目记忆没有显著差异;以词表线索提取,两类项目     

Should a criminal receive a heart transplant? Medical Justice vs. Societal Justice

Should the nation provide expensive care and scarce organs to convicted felons? We distinguish between two fields of justice: Medical Justice and Societal Justice. Although there is general acceptance within the medical profession that physicians may distribute limited treatments based solely on potential medical benefits without regard to nonmedical factors, that does not mean that society cannot impose limits based on societal factors. If a society considers the convicted felon to be a full member, then that person would be entitled to at least a “decent minimum” level of care — which might include access to scarce life-saving organs. However, if criminals forfeit their entitlement to the same level of medical care afforded to all members of society, they still would be entitled to a kind of “rudimentary decent minimum” granted to all persons on simple humanitarian grounds. Almost certainly this entitlement would not include access to organ transplants.     

关于听觉条件下中文字词劣效果的研究

对听觉条件下中文字词劣效果的问题进行了实验考察,结果发现：在文章听点作业中,被试对高、低频目标字词语音的正误判断量存在着显著性差别,前者较后者成绩差,表现出字词劣效果的现象;在单字词的听点作业中,未发现被试对高、低频目标字词语音正误判断量方面的显著性差别;无论在文章还是单字词的听点作业中,被试对高、低频目标字词语音的正误判断量均比较低下,表明语音知觉的范畴性特征对字词语音的辩认准确性具有较大影响。     

The relative law of effect: effects of shock intensity on response strength in multiple schedules

Key pecking of four birds was reinforced with food according to a two-component multiple variable-interval 1-minute variable-interval 4-minute schedule. In addition, key pecking was punished by a brief shock according to a variable-interval 30-second schedule during both components of the multiple schedule. The intensity of the shock was varied. For all birds, punishment had a stronger suppressive effect on the responding maintained by the leaner food schedule, and the ratio of responding during the two components of the multiple schedule became closer to the ratio of reinforcement as shock intensity was increased, as the relative law of effect predicts. At the higher shock intensity, there was some evidence that the ratio of responses overmatched the ratio of reinforcements.     

Warmup in avoidance as a function of time since prior training

On avoidance procedures, rats and pigeons typically show warmup effects, characterized by improving performance within sessions and loss of the improvement (“warmup decrement”) between sessions. Between-session losses were examined by varying the time between periods of avoidance training. In one experiment, rats lived fulltime in conditioning chambers while intermission intervals were varied. In a second experiment, the animals lived in home cages between sessions; timeout intervals were introduced at midession, producing recurrence of warmup in the second half-session. In both experiments, the warmup decrements increased substantially as the timeout or intersession intervals were increased from zero to 30 minutes. With intervals of 60 or 120 minutes, the decrements approached or exceeded those obtained with intervals of a day or more. When avoidance was interposed between appetitive sessions, the appetitive responding was disrupted, but this seemed unrelated to the warmup or to the proficiency of avoidance. The warmup in avoidance shares characteristics with transient punishment effects, with the Kamin effect, and with habituation phenomena, but it is premature to assume that they reflect common processes.     

Tests for stability in linear structural equation systems

Interpretations regarding the effects of exogenous and endogenous variables on endogenous variables in linear structural equation systems depend upon the convergence of a matrix power series. Convergence depends upon the eigenvalues of the structural coefficient matrix. The test for convergence developed by Jöreskog and Sörbom is shown to be only sufficient, not necessary and sufficient.     

Reinforcement magnitude and the inhibiting effect of reinforcement

In a two-key concurrent variable-interval schedule (using pigeons), if the reinforcement frequency for one response is held constant while that for the other is increased, the rate of response on the constant key decreases. The immediate reinforcement for key pecking can usually be conceptualized as the change from a condition in which the key light is on and the food hopper light is off to one in which the key light is off and the hopper light is on. The prechange condition is associated with a delay to food of one-half the average interreinforcement interval in effect during this condition. The postchange condition is associated with a delay to food of about .5 seconds. The programming of additional reinforcement results in a decrease in the delay to food associated with the prechange stimulus condition, and thus a decrease in the value of the improvement that results from the change. This would appear to be analogous to a decrease in the amount of reinforcement, and thus sufficient explanation for the decrease in the rate of the response.     

Serial learning in the pigeon.

Three pigeons learned to peck four colors in a particular sequence, regardless of how these colors were positioned on four response keys and without feedback following each response. This demonstrates that serial learning is possible in subprimate animals.     

Demand for food on fixed-ratio schedules as a function of the quality of concurrently available reinforcement

Six rats lever pressed for food on concurrent fixed-ratio schedules, in a two-compartment chamber. In one compartment, mixed diet pellets were delivered on fixed-ratio schedules of 1, 6, 11, and 16; in the other, either no food was delivered, or sucrose or mixed diet pellets were delivered on fixed-ratio 8. The number of pellets obtained in the first compartment declined as a function of fixed-ratio size in that compartment in all three conditions, but the decline was greatest overall with mixed diet pellets concurrently available in the other compartment, and least with no food concurrently available. The result is discussed in terms of economic demand theory, and is consistent with the prediction that elasticity of demand for a commodity (defined in operant terms as the ratio of the proportionate change in number of reinforcements per session to the proportionate change in fixed-ratio size) is greater the more substitutable for that commodity are any concurrently available commodities.