Induced Attack During Fixed‐ratio and Matched‐time Schedules of Food Presentation

Abstract

Adjunctive or induced behavior is generated during a variety of schedules of reinforcement. Several theoretical conceptualizations suggest that rate of reinforcement is the primary variable controlling the strength or levels of induced behavior. The operant response requirement within the schedule context has not been extensively studied as a determinant of induced responding. In the present study, levels of induced attack by food-deprived pigeons against restrained conspecifics were compared during response-dependent and response-independent schedules of food presentation equated or yoked interval-by-interval for reinforcement frequency. Experiment 1 compared levels of attack induced by fixed-ratio schedules of key pecking and yoked ''matched-time'' schedules. Experiment 2 similarly compared chained fixed-ratio 1 fixed-ratio 74 and yoked chained matched-time matched-time schedules. In both experiments, the response-dependent schedules generated greater levels (amount and probability) of induced attack than the response-independent time-based schedules. Thus, the ratio response requirement may be an important determinant of levels of induced responding, and the lower levels of attack observed during the response-independent condition may not be due to the absence of stimuli predicting food presentations. It is concluded that rate of reinforcement is not the sole variable determining levels of induced responding and that response-based and time-based schedules differ in their generation of induced responding.Key words: schedule-induced attack, adjunctive behavior, target pigeons, fixed-ratio schedules, matched-time schedules, key peck, pigeons _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ __ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _Behavior neither elicited nor directly reinforced is generated and maintained during many intermittent schedules of reinforcement. Adjunctive or schedule-induced behavior includes drinking or polydipsia in rats (e.g., Falk, 1961a,b), pigeons (Magyar & Malagodi, 1980), and monkeys (Porter & Kenshalo, 1974), aggression in rats (Huston & DeSisto, 1971) and pigeons (e.g., Azrin, Hutchinson, & Hake, 1966;Flory, 1969a;Pitts & Malagodi, 1996;Webbe, DeWeese, & Malagodi, 1974); escape (Azrin, 1961;Brown & Flory, 1972;Thompson, 1964); wheel-running (Levitsky & Collier, 1968); hose-biting (DeWeese, 1977;Hutchinson, Azrin, & Hunt, 1968); and a host of other activities (Kelly & Hake, 1970;Killeen, 1975;Lyon & Turner, 1972;Mendelson & Chillag, 1970;Miller & Gollub, 1974;Muller, Crow, & Cheney, 1979;Staddon & Simmelhag, 1971). These topographically dissimilar behaviors display certain functional commonalities when induced during schedules of reinforcement, including: (a) the temporal locus within the interreinforcement interval (induced behavior typically occurs in the immediate postreinforcement period when operant or terminal behavior is low in probability); (b) the gradual development over time of induced behavior with extended exp...

Culture and Child Attachment Patterns: a Behavioral Systems Synthesis

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A critical assessment of Murray Sidman’s approach to coercion

“…Results of several experiments suggest that, contrary to Sidman's assumptions, positive reinforcement contingencies may exhibit aversive functions. This can be seen, for example, in experiments on aggression induced by positive reinforcement (Kupfer et al, 2003;Richards & Rilling 1972), self-imposed time-out of positive reinforcement (Azrin, 1961;Lydersen, 1997), as well as in the relativity of the reinforcing or aversive function of a given schedule of reinforcement depending on the available alternatives (Everly et al, 2014;Retzlaff et al, 2017).…”

Religion as schedule-induced behavior

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