James Allison

Acquired fear, brightness preference, and one-way shuttlebox performance

Rats choosing between black and white showed an unlearned preference for black which was strengthened by previous shock in white, and weakened but not reversed by equivalent shock in black. Congruous findings were obtained with a one-way shuttlebox: escape from white to black occurred more readily than escape from black to white, whether S had or had not been shocked in the start compartment. Incongruously, fear conditioning did not facilitate escape performance, but rather impaired it early in training.

Instrumental and contingent saccharin licking in rats: Response deprivation and reinforcement

Instrumental licking of .4% saccharin solution was increased by the contingent opportunity to lick a less-preferred saccharin solution when the contingency schedule deprived the subject of the contingent response, but not otherwise. Schedules that imposed comparable amounts of response deprivation produced comparable increases in instrumental responding. The results support the hypothesis that instrumental responding will increase if and only if the contingency schedule deprives the subject of the contingent response. They also support the implication that the predicted increase will occur even if the contingent response has a lower operant level than the instrumental response.

Response deprivation and instrumental performance in the controlled-amount paradigm ☆

Abstract The response deprivation analysis, previously applied to a paradigm frequently used in free operant experiments, was applied successfully to another paradigm frequently used in discrete trials experiments. Each trial ended when the rat performed 1 lick at an empty tube (E), and either 10 or 100 licks at a second tube containing either saccharin (S) or water (W). Baseline trials were begun by exposing both tubes. Contigency trials required 1 instrumental E-lick for access to the second tube. Rate of instrumental responding, relative to baseline, was directly proportional to the value required if the subject were to perform the contingent licks at their baseline rates. The results also confirmed the predicted functional relations between the absolute rate of instrumental responding and the number of contingent S-licks, the number of contingent W-licks, and hours of water deprivation. Critical implications for the concept of instrumental reinforcement were discussed.

Individual differences in eating and drinking in the rat

In a sample of four rats, highly reliable individual differences were found on the variables which determine drinking rate and eating rate: the interval between successive licks (p < .001), and the interval between successive contacts with food (p < .005), within bursts of drinking and eating, respectively. Intervals within bursts of eating were longer (p < .01) and more variable than intervals within bursts of drinking. Individual differences accounted for .23 of the variance in the case of drinking, and .03 of the variance in the case of eating.

Wage rate, nonlabor income, and labor supply in rats☆

Abstract Thirsty rats pressed a lever for water under fixed-ratio schedules, with or without free water at the start of the 1-hr session. Total water intake fell steadily as the fixed-ratio requirement increased; when the fixed-ratio requirements covered a relatively broad range, total lever presses rose and then fell as the requirement increased. Free water decreased total lever presses but increased total intake, especially at the higher fixed-ratio requirements; its effect on total intake proved relatively hard to detect, but grew more apparent as the amount of free water increased. The results conformed more closely to a recent revision of the conservation model than to the original model. By viewing milliliters per press as a wage rate, and free water as nonlabor income, results are brought to bear on predictions derived from economic labor supply theory. In economic terms, rising wage rates were accompanied by a rise followed by a fall in total labor supply, but a steady rise in total income, in conformity with the backward bending labor supply curve. Nonlabor income cut the supply of labor but raised total income, especially at the lower wage rates.

Macro- and microbehavioral response to viscosity among rats licking saccharin

Effects of viscosity upon licking were studied by providing rats with thick and thin.4% saccharin solutions in separate 1-h sessions. Volumetric intake/lick was greater for the thin than for the thick solution and was the only measure affected by viscosity. As the session progressed, the two solutions caused (1) comparable satiation effects, as evidenced by comparable decreases in several indices of the average rate of ingestion; (2) comparable decreases in the average duration of the lick; and (3) no reliable change in the average volumetric intake of the lick. The results were related to earlier comparisons of liquid food and saccharin and indicated that the differences produced by the latter solutions are not fully attributable to their differential viscosity.

Behavioral Substitutes and Complements

Publisher Summary Biologists and economists alike have called attention to some remarkable similarities between the animal foraging optimally by the lights of ecological theory and the human consuming optimally by the lights of economic theory. Each of the two theories would allow a prominent place for notions of substitutability and complementarity. The specific selection represents an attempt to maximize biological fitness. A predator too has budgetary constraints that depend on variables such as the time and energy available for foraging and relative prey abundance. The selection depends partly on a fitness contour analogous to the indifference curve of economic theory.

Time spent in the goal box: Effects of frequency and schedule of reinforcement

Running times showed a typical partial reinforcement effect in a runway which allowed S to retrace from goal to stem. Retrace times on nonreward trials agreed with frustration theory, in that (a) during training, partially rewarded Ss spent less time in the goal box than continuously nonrewarded Ss, and (b) during extinction, time spent in the goal box was a decreasing function of the frequency of prior reward.

Chance and Rationality.

Fundamental relations in psychology and economics can be derived from the assumption of random response to external constraint. These include the demand law, whereby consumption decreases as the price of the good increases; the normal rise in consumption with income; schedule functions in which the contingent response decreases linearly as the instrumental response increases; nonexclusive preference for the richer component of a concurrent ratio schedule; and the effects of nonlabor income, which decreases both labor and consumption when compensated for total income but increases consumption otherwise. Thus, behavior that appears rational, optimal, or adaptive may truly be a random response to external constraint. Even if behavior is not random, predictions that are based on the random response model may often provide the most appropriate null hypothesis

Time spent with food and nonfood incentives as a function of food deprivation

Rats were presented with pairs of the following incentives at 0. 11, and 22 hr. of food deprivation: food, plaything, and rat. Time spent with food increased up to 11 hr., but time spent with plaything vs. rat was independent of food deprivation. Ss preferred plaything to rat, food to rat, and food to plaything, with one exception: nondeprived Ss preferred plaything to food.