Concurrent evidence of extinction making acquisition context specific and ABA and ABC renewal effects in human predictive learning.

Abstract

Two experiments evaluated whether the experience of extinction makes acquisition context specific (EMACS) while the extinction learning itself also becomes context dependent under ABA and ABC renewal designs in a human predictive learning situation. Two groups of participants received X-Outcome pairings in context A followed by P-Outcome pairings in context B. For participants in group E, cue X was then extinguished in context B while cue P was trained. Participants in group NE were trained with P, but they did not have the extinction experience. Testing target cues outside the context B (i.e. the context in which P was trained and X was extinguished) in group E led to an increase in responding to cue X (Renewal effect) and a decrease in responding to cue P (EMACS effect) regardless of whether the test was conducted in context A (Experiment 1) or in an alternative context C (Experiment 2). Combined results suggest that Renewal and EMACS effects may be based on the same underlying mechanism.

Increasing previous but not concurrent extinction attenuates the “extinction makes acquisition context specific” effect in human predictive learning.

“…Experiment 1 found that extinction of a cue (E) made contextspecific retrieval of a different association (P-O) that was learned while cue E was extinguished in group EC12. This result replicates the EMACS effect reported by Callejas-Aguilera (2006, 2007) when the procedure was entirely conducted online with participants recruited from different countries and running the experiment in their own devices (see also Ogallar et al, 2019Ogallar et al, , 2021.…”

“…As that condition is not fulfilled in our experiments (P is never presented alone), to assume that contexts play the role of modulators in the EMACS effect would require us to accept that the modulatory role played by the contexts is different from the modulatory role played by discrete cues, as recent studies begin to suggest (see Balea et al, 2020). Alternatively, it is also possible that contextual control on extinction and EMACS effects would be exerted through different underlying mechanisms, even when they are found within the same situation, as reported by Ogallar et al (2021). Establishing the role played by the contexts when controlling performance in the EMACS effect would require of conducting specific tests that lay beyond the scope of this experimental series (see Nelson et al, 2011).…”

“…However, it is more difficult to assume that the generalization decrement between AE and BE leads to an increase in responding after extinction (AAB renewal) when no effect of context change is found in the absence of extinction (see Ogallar et al, 2021). Ogallar et al (2021) claim that finding EMACS and renewal within the same task and context renders as the most plausible explanation for both effects that contexts play a role akin to occasion setters (e.g., Holland, 1984;Ross & Holland, 1981). This explanation is commonly accepted in most renewal effects (see Bouton, 1993).…”

“…Renewal of acquisition performance has been also found when acquisition and extinction take place in the same context, and the test is conducted in a different context (AAB renewal, Bouton & Ricker, 1994;Thomas et al, 2003), and also when acquisition, extinction and testing are conducted in three different contexts (ABC renewal, Harris et al, 2000;Ogallar et al, 2021;Thomas et al, 2003). Similar results have been reported when using counterconditioning (e.g., Nelson & Callejas-Aguilera, 2007;Rosas, García-Gutiérrez & Callejas-Aguilera, 2006), rather than extinction, suggesting that renewal is a general phenomenon that may be found across different tasks and species (e.g., Bouton, 1993;Ogallar et al, 2017;Vervliet et al, 2013).…”

“…The EMACS effect is demonstrated when a cue (P) that has been paired with the outcome after the start of extinction of a different cue (E) is more affected by a context change than a cue that is trained in the absence of the extinction experience (e.g., Bernal-Gamboa et al, 2014;Ogallar et al, 2019;Rosas, García-Gutiérrez, & Callejas-Aguilera, 2006; see also Bernal-Gamboa et al, 2013). suggest that the process that underlies both, renewal and EMACS effects, is an increase in attention to the contexts raised by the growth in prediction error caused by the extinction experience (see also Ogallar et al, 2021;. From this perspective, renewal and EMACS effects will appear whenever the organism pays attention to the context when the cue is extinguished (renewal) or paired with the outcome (EMACS).…”