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INHIBITORY CONTROL AND ERRORLESS DISCRIMINATION LEARNING 1
Author(s) -
Karpicke John,
Hearst Eliot
Publication year - 1975
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.1975.23-159
Subject(s) - psychology , stimulus (psychology) , reinforcement , stimulus control , stimulus generalization , pecking order , audiology , developmental psychology , cognitive psychology , neuroscience , social psychology , perception , biology , ecology , medicine , nicotine
Pigeons learned to discriminate between a positive stimulus (white key) and a negative stimulus (red or green key, depending on the subject) via Terrace's fading procedure. Generalization tests, conducted with intermittent reinforcement for key pecking at various wavelengths, yielded minima at the value of the negative stimulus in most “errorless” birds. Terrace's contrary finding of flat gradients in errorless subjects probably resulted from a floor‐effect ( i.e. , virtually zero responding) produced by his extinction‐test procedure. The present and other findings do not support Terrace's conclusions that the negative stimulus of an errorless discrimination is behaviorally neutral; inhibition apparently develops to the nonreinforced stimulus even during errorless discrimination learning. A negative correlation between stimulus and reinforcer seems the crucial factor in producing an inhibitory stimulus.