George S. Reynolds

Temporal Discrimination in Pigeons

Pigeons trained to peck a lighted key were presented with a key that was alternately dark and lighted. The key was dark for intervals of from 3 to 30 seconds. Pecking of the lighted key was reinforced only after the shortest or, in a second experiment, the longest interval that the key was dark. The pigeons were able to discriminate the duration of the dark interval.