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Individual Differences in the Orienting Reflex and Children&s Discriminiation Learning
Author(s) -
Cousins Laurence R.
Publication year - 1976
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.1469-8986.1976.tb00865.x
Subject(s) - habituation , psychology , orienting response , stimulus (psychology) , heart rate , audiology , reflex , developmental psychology , discrimination learning , cognitive psychology , neuroscience , medicine , blood pressure , radiology
The relationship between individual differences in the Magnitude of the cardiac components of the orienting reflex and learning rate on a two‐choice discrimination task was investigated. This was done by assessing the heart rate response of 128 9 to 11‐yr‐old male subjects to a habituation‐dishabituation series of 24 non‐signal tactual stimuli. These same subjects were then administered a tactual discrimination learning task in which trials to criterion were recorded as the dependent variable. The overall heart rate analyses suggested that the orienting reflex was elicited by the stimulus series, that it habituated over the course of the first 20 presentations and then dishabituated on the presentation of a novel stimulus. The cardiac data of fast and slow learners suggested that there were clear‐cut differences in the heart rate response between these two groups, with the former group showing a larger magnitude OR and slower habituation than the latter group.learning rate was discussed within a two‐stage learning theory framework.