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Effects of “Below‐Zero” Habituation on Spontaneous Recovery and Dishabituation of the Orienting Response
Author(s) -
Waters William F.,
McDonald David G.
Publication year - 1974
Publication title -
psychophysiology
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
SCImago Journal Rank - 1.661
H-Index - 156
eISSN - 1469-8986
pISSN - 0048-5772
DOI - 10.1111/j.1469-8986.1974.tb01112.x
Subject(s) - habituation , psychology , stimulus (psychology) , orienting response , audiology , skin conductance , spontaneous recovery , developmental psychology , cognitive psychology , neuroscience , medicine , biomedical engineering
Twenty male undergraduate S s underwent habituation of the skin conductance component of the orienting response to a neutral tone, spontaneous recovery, rehabituation, and dishabituation (habituation, H condition). Another 20 S s underwent the same procedure, except they received an additional 10 stimulus presentations immediately after initial habituation (extended habituation, EH condition). The EH condition resulted in more (not significant) spontaneous recovery and trials to rehabituation than did the H condition, indicating that such a “below‐zero” habituation procedure did not strengthen habituation. There were significant differences between the groups in response to a post‐rehabituation buzzer (dishabituating stimulus), and in response to the subsequent re‐presentation of the original tone stimulus (dishabituation), the EH group giving larger responses than the H group. These latter results were seen as consonant with both the Sokolov (1963) and Groves and Thompson (1970) approaches to habituation, and were discussed in that context.