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Effects of “Below‐Zero” Habituation on the Electrodermal Orienting Response to a Test Stimulus
Author(s) -
Stephenson David,
Siddle David A. T.
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.tb03327.x
Subject(s) - habituation , psychology , stimulus (psychology) , skin conductance , audiology , orienting response , neutral stimulus , amplitude , expectancy theory , developmental psychology , stimulus control , cognitive psychology , neuroscience , social psychology , physics , optics , medicine , biomedical engineering , nicotine
Two experiments were designed to investigate the effect of below‐zero habituation training on skin conductance response (SCR) amplitude to a change in auditory stimulus frequency. In both experiments, subjects were trained with a 1000 Hz tone until zero responding and then received 5, 10, or IS further training trials. In Experiment 1 (N=45), subjects then received 1 presentation of a test stimulus of 1400 Hz, while in Experiment 2 (N=45), the test stimulus was a tone of 670 Hz. On the basis of dual‐process theory, it was hypothesized that response amplitude to the test stimulus would be inversely related to amount of below‐zero training. However, the results of both experiments indicate that SCR amplitude was positively related to amount of below‐zero training. These results suggest that in situations of extended habituation training, an expectancy or subjective probability of stimulus occurrence gradient is important in determining response amplitude to a test stimulus.