Signaled reinforcement effects on fixed‐interval performance of rats with lever depressing or releasing as a target response[Note 1. This research was conducted with a grant in aid ...]

The effect of a diffuse auditory signal filling a brief delay between a response and reinforcement depends upon the nature of the trained target response. Rats in a signaled condition responded slower than rats in an unsignaled condition if the target response was lever release. If the target response was lever depression, however, rats in the signaled condition responded faster than rats in the unsignaled condition at the end of training