Biasing the pacemaker in the behavioral theory of timing

In the behavioral theory of timing, pacemaker rate is determined by overall rate of reinforcement. A two-alternative free-operant psychophysical procedure was employed to investigate whether pacemaker period was also sensitive to the differential rate of reinforcement. Responding on a left key during the first 25 s and on a right key during the second 25 s of a 50-s trial was reinforced at variable intervals, and variable-interval schedule values during the two halves of the trials were varied systematically. Responding on the right key during the first 25 s and on the left key during the second 25 s was not reinforced. Estimates of pacemaker period were derived from fits of a function predicted by the behavioral theory of timing to right-key response proportions in consecutive 5-s bins of the 50-s trial. Estimates of pacemaker period were shortest when the differential reinforcer rate most strongly favored right-key responses, and were longest when the differential reinforcer rate most strongly favored left-key responses. The results were consistent with the conclusion that pacemaker rate is influenced by relative reinforcer rate.     

Human d-amphetamine drug discrimination: methamphetamine and hydromorphone.

Standard measures of subjective and discriminative effects of drugs were compared in 5 human volunteers. Subjects responded on a second-order color-tracking procedure, where 30 mg of d-amphetamine served as a discriminative stimulus for one response and its absence as the discriminative stimulus for another response. Self-reported subjective effects were assessed concurrently using the single-dose questionnaire, subscales of the Addiction Research Center Inventory, and several analogue rating scales. On different days following discrimination acquisition, varying doses of d-amphetamine, methamphetamine, and hydromorphone were administered. In these test sessions, either response was reinforced. Methamphetamine and d-amphetamine occasioned dose-related increases in d-amphetamine appropriate responding; hydromorphone did not. Methamphetamine and d-amphetamine occasioned dose-related increases in reports of the drug received being most like "speed"; hydromorphone occasioned dose-related increases in reports of the drug received being most like "dope." All three drugs occasioned dose-related increases in reports of drug liking, and increases in the morphine-benzedrine group, amphetamine, and benzedrine group scales of the Addiction Research Center Inventory. This experiment demonstrated that although explicit discriminative control of behavior by a drug may covary with drug identification, it does not necessarily covary with other self-reported subjective effects. Thus, the complementary nature of the data provided by drug discrimination and standard subjective-effects measures provides quantitative and qualitative data useful in studying both relatively novel compounds and the behavioral biology of psychoactive drugs in general.     

Temporal discrimination learning of operant feeding in goldfish (Carassius auratus)

Operant temporal discrimination learning was investigated in goldfish. In the first experiment, there was a fixed daily change in illumination. Eight subjects were trained to operate a lever that reinforced each press with food. The period during which responses were reinforced was then progressively reduced until it was 1 hr in every 24. The final 1-hr feeding schedule was maintained over 4 weeks. The feeding period commenced at the same time each day throughout. The food dispensers were then made inactive, and a period of extinction ensued for 6 days. The pattern of responding suggested that the fish were able to exhibit temporal discrimination in anticipation of feeding time. This pattern of responding persisted for a limited number of days during the extinction procedure. The second experiment produced evidence that operant temporal discrimination could develop under continuous illumination.     

Discrimination of methadone and cocaine by pigeons without explicit discrimination training.

Pigeons were trained to peck a key on a variable-interval 2-min schedule of food reinforcement. Prior to each session, either 2.0 mg/kg methadone (n = 3), 3.0 mg/kg cocaine (n = 4), or 5.6 mg/kg cocaine (n = 2) was administered. When each pigeon's rate of pecking was stable, a range of doses of the training drug and saline were administered prior to 20-min extinction sessions separated by at least four training sessions. Rate of pecking during these extinction tests was generally an increasing function of dose, with the lowest rates obtained following saline and low doses and the highest rates obtained following doses near the training doses. Dose functions from pigeons trained with 5.6 mg/kg cocaine were steeper than those from pigeons trained with 3.0 mg/kg cocaine. Pigeons trained with methadone or 3.0 mg/kg cocaine were then given discrimination training, in which food reinforcement followed drug administration and 20-min extinction sessions followed saline administration. Rates of pecking under these conditions quickly diverged until near-zero rates were obtained following saline and high rates were obtained following drug. Discrimination training steepened dose functions for the training drugs, and the effects of several other substituted drugs depended on the pharmacology of the training drug. The pigeons trained with 5.6 mg/kg cocaine were tested with d-amphetamine, methadone, and morphine prior to discrimination training. d-Amphetamine increased rates dose dependently, and methadone and morphine did not. The results suggest that discriminative control by methadone and cocaine was established without explicit discrimination training.     

Detecting a nonevent: Delayed presence-versus-absence discrimination in pigeons

Eight pigeons were trained on a delayed presence-versus-absence discrimination paradigm in which a sample stimulus was presented on some trials but not on others. If a sample was presented, then a response to one choice key produced food. If no sample was presented, a response to the other choice key produced food. The basic finding was that performance remained constant and well above 50% correct on no-sample trials as the retention interval increased, whereas performance dropped precipitously (to below 50% correct) on sample trials. In the second phase of the experiment, all of the trials were no-sample trials, and reinforcers were delivered probabilistically for one group of pigeons and according to time-based schedules for the other group. The exact reinforcement probabilities used in Phase 2 were those calculated to be in effect on no-sample trials in Phase 1 (according to a discrete-state model of performance). Subjects did not show exclusive preference for the richer alternative on no-sample trials in the first phase, but those in the probabilistic group developed near-exclusive preference for the richer alternative during the second phase. These data are inconsistent with the predictions of the discrete-state model, but are easily accommodated by an account based on signal detection theory, which also can be applied effectively to discrimination of event duration and the “subjective shortening” effect.     

Infant auditory perception: Tonal masking

The results of an earlier study (Olsho, 1984) indicated that 5- to 8-month-old infants were relatively better at discriminating among high-frequency pitches than low. In the present study, sensory and nonsensory explanations for that effect were evaluated by examining infants' performance in a task requiring similar sensory processing but differing in the demands placed on processes such as memory. Infants' ability to resolve frequency was tested using a tonal masking paradigm, the psychophysical tuning curve. Twenty-four infants were tested at probe frequencies ranging from 500 to 4000 Hz; a group of young adults served as a comparison. Masked and unmasked thresholds were estimated using the visually reinforced head turn procedure in conjunction with an adaptive psychophysical method. Although infants' tuning curves fell below those of adults (indicating poorer performance), the widths and slopes of the infants' curves were not different from the adults'. Moreover, the difference between age groups remained constant across probe frequencies. These findings imply that by 5 months of age, the infant's ability to resolve sound frequency is similar to the adult's.     

Reaction times of pigeons on a wavelength discrimination task

After extensive pretraining, three pigeons were exposed in 2-second trials to a random series of 14 light wavelengths, ranging in one nanometer (nm) steps from 575 nanometers to 589 nanometers. Responses to one of the wavelengths, 582 nanometers, were intermittently reinforced. The relative frequency of response approached 1.0 at 582 nanometers, and decreased with progressively higher and lower wavelengths. Reaction times shorter than about 0.2 second occurred with a low frequency that was largely independent of wavelength. Wavelength controlled the frequency of longer reaction times, but did not affect the distribution of these reaction times. Consequently, receiver-operating characteristic curves constructed by using reaction time as a rating measure did not conform to the signal-detection model, in contrast to such conformity when response rate is used in a similar way. The data suggest that stimulus onset as such triggers early response emission with some small probability; the probability of responses with longer latency is controlled by wavelength, but their time of emission is controlled by some independent process.     

Stimulus control of Pavlovian facilitation

Two experiments were conducted using an autoshaping procedure with pigeons to examine whether dimensional stimulus control by a Pavlovian facilitator parallels the control established following operant discrimination training. Facilitation training consisted of the presentation of a black vertical line on a white background as the B stimulus in a feature-positive discrimination in which the A stimulus (white keylight) was followed by grain presentation only if preceded by B. In this way, B facilitates or sets the occasion for pecking at A. Subsequent testing for generalization along the line-orientation dimension produced decremental gradients when the facilitation paradigm incorporated an explicit feature-negative stimulus (B−). These results parallel the decremental control obtained following operant discrimination training and suggest that Pavlovian facilitators and instrumental discriminative stimuli are functionally equivalent.     

CONDITIONAL DISCRIMINATION VS. MATCHING TO SAMPLE: AN EXPANSION OF THE TESTING PARADIGM

A subject's performance under a conditional-discrimination procedure defines conditional relations between stimuli: “If A1, then B1; if A2, then B2.” The procedure may also generate matching to sample. If so, the stimuli will be related not only by conditionality, but by equivalence: A1 and B1 will become equivalent members of one stimulus class, A2 and B2 of another. One paradigm for testing whether a conditional-discrimination procedure has generated equivalence relations uses three sets of stimuli, A, B, and C, three stimuli per set. Subjects learn to select Set-B and Set-C comparisons conditionally upon Set-A samples. Having been explicitly taught six sample-comparison relations, A1B1, A1C1, A2B2, A2C2, A3B3, and A3C3, subjects prove immediately capable of matching the B- and C-stimuli; six new relations emerge (B1C1, B2C2, B3C3, C1B1, C2B2, C3B3). The 12 stimulus relations, six taught and six emergent, define the existence of three three-member stimulus classes, A1B1C1, A2B2C2, and A3B3C3. This paradigm was expanded by introducing three more stimuli (Set D), and teaching eight children not only the AB and AC relations but DC relations also—selecting Set-C comparisons conditionally upon Set-D samples. Six of the children proved immediately capable of matching the B- and D-stimuli to each other. By selecting appropriate Set-B comparisons conditionally upon Set-D samples, and Set-D comparisons conditionally upon Set-B samples, they demonstrated the existence of three four-member stimulus classes, A1B1C1D1, A2B2C2D2, and A3B3C3D3. These larger classes were confirmed by the subjects' success with the prerequisite lower-level conditional relations; they were also able to select Set-D comparisons conditionally upon samples from Sets A and C, and to do the BC and CB matching that defined the original three-member classes. Adding the three DC relations therefore generated 12 more, three each in BD, DB, AD, and CD. Enlarging each class by one member brought about a disproportionate increase in the number of emergent relations. Ancillary oral naming tests suggested that the subject's application of the same name to each stimulus was neither necessary nor sufficient to establish classes of equivalent stimuli.     

The acquisition of observing.

Pigeons were exposed to stimuli correlated with the presence or absence of a variable-interval 60-second schedule of reinforcement only while they depressed a crossbar or "perch." In the first experiment, the stimuli were different tilts of a line displayed on the key. When the difference in brightness between the line and the background (salience) was maximal, seven of eight birds acquired the discrimination, but when the difference was reduced by 50%, only one succeeded. In the second experiment, wavelength of chamber illumination served as the relevant dimension. Neither experiment showed a large effect attributable to the magnitude of the difference (disparity) between the positive and the negative stimulus. Individual differences in time spent observing were positively correlated with level of discrimination in the presence of the stimuli. All birds produced the positive stimulus for a greater proportion of the available time than they did the negative stimulus. This may be the mechanism that provides selective reinforcement of observing. Finally, the formation of a discrimination was analyzed in terms of changes in the proportion of time spent in contact with the discriminative stimuli.