Premium
PROBABILITY OF RESPONSE AND PROBABILITY OF REINFORCEMENT IN A RESPONSE‐DEFINED ANALOGUE OF AN INTERVAL SCHEDULE 1
Author(s) -
Millenson J. R.
Publication year - 1966
Publication title -
journal of the experimental analysis of behavior
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
SCImago Journal Rank - 0.75
H-Index - 61
eISSN - 1938-3711
pISSN - 0022-5002
DOI - 10.1901/jeab.1966.9-87
Subject(s) - reinforcement , pecking order , function (biology) , differential reinforcement , schedule , psychology , chain (unit) , interval (graph theory) , statistics , mathematics , computer science , social psychology , combinatorics , biology , physics , genetics , evolutionary biology , operating system , astronomy
Variable interval (VI) responding was hypothesized to be a function of differential reinforcement susceptibilities of various unspecified behavior chains that mediate interresponse times (IRTs). To test this hypothesis, probabilities of reinforcement were regulated for the lengths of chains of key pecking responses of pigeons, analogous to the way that VI regulates probabilities of reinforcement for IRTs. This procedure generated a number of VI‐like effects, supporting the notion that VI behavior can be construed as a special case of an interaction between the organism's function relating reinforcement susceptibilities to chain length and the experimenter's function relating probabilities of reinforcement to chain length.