Conditioned suppression and variable ratio reinforcement1

Pausing under variable-ratio schedules: Interaction of reinforcer magnitude, variable-ratio size, and lowest ratio.

Pigeons pecked a key under two-component multiple variable-ratio schedules that offered 8-s or 2-s access to grain. Postreinforcement pausing and the rates of responding following the pause (run rates) in each component were measured as a function of variable-ratio size and the size of the lowest ratio in the configuration of ratios comprising each schedule. In one group of subjects, variable-r...

Rats’ location during conditioned suppression training

Familiarity-Based Stimulus Generalization of Conditioned Suppression

We report that stimulus novelty/familiarity is able to modulate stimulus generalization and discuss the theoretical implications of novelty/familiarity coding. Rats in Skinner boxes received clicker → shock pairings before generalization testing to a tone. Before clicker training, different groups of rats received preexposure treatments designed to systematically modulate the clicker and the to...

Stimulus modality effects on transformations of conditioned enhancement and conditioned suppression in rats.

Unconditioned and conditioned effects of house-light offset and acoustic white noise on barpressing behavior maintained by intermittent food reinforcement were tested in male hooded rats. Presentations of these stimuli prior to their acquiring signal value initially tended to depress and then to enhance barpressing rate, but generally the rate of the on-going barpressing was lower during the li...

Transfer of conditioned suppression and conditioned acceleration from instrumental to consummatory baselines

Following training on a variable-interval food reinforcement schedule, rats were exposed to Pavlovian procedures which produced reliable conditioned suppression and conditioned acceleration of the leverpressing (instrumental) baseline. When free food was simultaneously made available in the test cage, all subjects spent the majority of each session "freeloading," that is, eating food from a dis...