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REINFORCEMENT BY AN IMPRINTING STIMULUS VERSUS WATER ON SIMPLE SCHEDULES IN DUCKLINGS
Author(s) -
DePaulo Peter,
Hoffman Howard S.
Publication year - 1981
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.1981.36-151
Subject(s) - reinforcement , imprinting (psychology) , stimulus (psychology) , stimulus control , psychology , computer science , cognitive psychology , neuroscience , social psychology , biology , biochemistry , gene , nicotine
Ducklings (5 to 28 days old) were trained to peck a pole on fixed‐ratio, fixed‐interval, and multiple schedules using brief presentation of an imprinting stimulus as the response‐contingent event. Other ducklings of the same age were trained similarly except that reinforcement consisted of access to water. With water reinforcement the typical fixed‐ratio (“break‐run”), fixed‐interval (“scallop”), and multiple schedule response patterns were readily established and consistently maintained. With the imprinting stimulus these schedule effects were inconsistent in some subjects and virtually nonexistent in others, despite extended training. Schedule control with the imprinting stimulus was not improved by the use of a reinforcement signaling procedure which enhances responding reinforced by electrical brain stimulation on intermittent schedules. However, the overall rates of responding and the extinction functions generated after reinforcement with water versus the imprinting stimulus were comparable. These findings imply that control by temporal and discriminative stimuli may be relatively weak when a young organism's behavior is reinforced by presentation of an imprinting stimulus.