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CONCURRENT ASSESSMENT OF SCHEDULE AND INTENSITY CONTROL ACROSS SUCCESSIVE DISCRIMINATIONS 1
Author(s) -
Raslear Thomas G.,
PierrelSorrentino Rosemary,
Brissey Catherine
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.1975.23-247
Subject(s) - reinforcement , tone (literature) , intensity (physics) , decibel , audiology , lever , schedule , psychology , sound intensity , statistics , speech recognition , acoustics , mathematics , computer science , sound (geography) , social psychology , medicine , optics , physics , art , literature , quantum mechanics , operating system
Two chinchillas were trained on a series of two‐valued auditory intensity discriminations. Lever presses were reinforced when no tone was present and not reinforced in the presence of a four‐kiloHertz tone. The intensity of the nonreinforced tone was successively decreased, increasing the difficulty of the discrimination, until differential responding resembled that on a mixed schedule (no‐tone‐no‐tone). Response data were partitioned in such a way as to provide a continuing assessment of the relative amounts of control exerted by the reinforcement schedule and the sound intensity, respectively. Control by reinforcement density was a direct function of discrimination difficulty, whereas the control exerted by intensity was inversely related to difficulty. For these chinchillas, the absolute threshold value obtained at four kiloHertz was about two decibels referenced to 20 microNewtons per meter squared.