Memory retrieval and discrimination learning

Capaldi, E. J.; Miller, Daniel J.; Alptekin, Suzan; Barry, Kimberly; Haggbloom, Steven J.

doi:10.1016/0023-9690(91)90006-t

Cited by 4 publications

(5 citation statements)

References 11 publications

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“…Presumably, as training progresses and as rats are better able to discriminate between, for example, the black and white alternatives (or an intertrial reinforcement trial and a runway trial), the tendency to retrieve memories in a situation other than the specific one in which they were stored declines. As we have seen, too, this is true when the runway and goalbox differ (e.g., lobe & Mellgren, 1974;lobe et al, 1977) and when the storage ITI and the retrieval ITI differ (e.g., Capaldi et al , 1992;Capaldi et al, 1968;Capaldi et al , 1986b). Later in this paper, I shall speculate upon what memories are retrieved late in training in transitions from S-to S+ and from S+ to S-.…”

Section: Discrimination Learning and Sequential Theorymentioning

confidence: 80%

“…Discriminative responding consists of faster running in S+ than in S-. Some sequential work has been carried out in the choice situation, particularly the T maze (see, e.g., Capaldi, Alptekin, Miller, & Barry, 1992). Unless otherwise specified, however, I will be referring to brightness differential conditioning.…”

Section: Discrimination Learning and Sequential Theorymentioning

confidence: 99%

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The sequential view: From rapidly fading stimulus traces to the organization of memory and the abstract concept of number

Capaldi

1994

Psychonomic Bulletin & Review

133

207

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The development ofthe sequential approach to instrumentallearning from about 1958 to the present is described. The sequential model began as an attempt to explain a particular dass of neglected partial reward phenomena, those in which performance in acquisition and extinction is influenced by the particular sequence in which rewarded and nonrewarded trials occur in acquisition, and it was subsequently applied to a variety of other phenomena. Over time, the sequential model grew, sometimes through the replacement of older assumptions by novel ones, as when retrieved memories replaced stimulus traces, and sometimes simply through the addition of novel assumptions, such as that animals are capable of remembering retrospectively one, two, three or more prior nonrewarded outcomes--the N-Iength assumption. The most recent assumption added to the sequential model is that on a given trial the animal may utilize its memory of prior reward outcomes to anticipate both the current reward outcome and one or more subsequent reward outcomes. One way to view the sequential model is to say that it is a specific theory in various degrees of competition with other specific theories. Several examples of this are provided. Another way to view the sequential model, a more important way in my opinion, is to see it as a representative of a general theoretical approach, intertrial theory, which differs in fundamental respects from another much more generaIly utilized theoretical approach, intratrial theory. I suggest that there is a substantial body of data that can be explained by intertrial mechanisms but not by intratrial mechanisms. The future may weIl reveal that the intertrial mechanisms have greater explanatory potential than the currently more popular intratrial mechanisms.The cognitive abilities of rats are far greater and more varied than was dreamed of even remotely until recently. Even now they are familiar to only a relative few. As Wright (1992) has recently indicated, an animal may perform poorly not because of its cognitive limitations, but because the experimenter has employed a task ill suited to the particular species. Varied reward situations, emphasized in this paper, have demonstrated themselves to be ideally suited to revealing a variety of complex abilities in rats. To be sure, varied reward situations were employed initiaIly to test the simplest of hypotheses. But varied reward situations, as we shall see, are very flexible, and when appropriately modified they can be ernployed in the service of many ends. Within the context ofthe author's sequential hypothesis, varied reward tasks have been repeatedly modified to reveal increasingly complex processes in the rat, an activity that is ongoing.In the present paper, varied reward refers to situations with the following characteristics. Animals receive two or more different reward outcomes, such as food reward Correspondence concerning this article should besent to E. J. Capaldi, Department of Psychological Sciences, Purdue University, 1364 Psychology Building, West ...

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Section: Discrimination Learning and Sequential Theorymentioning

confidence: 80%

Section: Discrimination Learning and Sequential Theorymentioning

confidence: 99%

The sequential view: From rapidly fading stimulus traces to the organization of memory and the abstract concept of number

Capaldi

1994

Psychonomic Bulletin & Review

133

207

View full text Add to dashboard Cite

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“…By invoking a retrospective memory of internal stimuli occasioned by trial outcomes as a mediating variable, sequential theory successfully provided an explanation for SA pattern learning, a vast array of data on the PREE, and the other paradoxical reinforcement effects identified above (see Capaldi, 1994). Other phenomena well explained by a careful examination of stimulus control by retrospective memories of trial outcomes include the successive negative contrast effect (Capaldi & Lynch, 1967) and reinforcement schedule effects on behavior in conventional discrimination learning situations with exteroceptive positive and negative discriminative stimuli (Capaldi, Miller, Alptekin, Barry, & Haggbloom, 1991).…”

Section: Reinforcement Schedule Effects and The Sequential Theorymentioning

confidence: 94%

Tribute to E. J. Capaldi: Celebration of a Psychological Scientist

Proctor

Altman

Haggbloom

et al. 2022

The American Journal of Psychology

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E. J. (John) Capaldi (1928–2020) made numerous contributions to experimental psychology in his long career at the University of Texas at Austin and Purdue University. He was a pioneer in the area of animal learning and cognition, known for his sequential theory of partial reinforcement extinction effects. His research in this area and in memory and counting phenomena was conducted for the most part with rats running in straight alley mazes under various sequences of trial outcomes (e.g., reward, nonreward, variations in reward size). John's other interests included the sequential theory applied to Pavlovian conditioning, evolutionary theory, and psychology of science. More generally, John was a scientist to the core who served as a role model to those who knew him. His career centered on the values of science and rigorous critical thinking based in empirical data, coupled with a curiosity and openness to different and new ideas in psychology.

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“…Retrieval of goal-event memories, too, may sometimes be impaired by a context change that does not retrieve an interfering or competing memory (e.g., Capaldi et al, 1991;Capaldi et al, 1986;lobe et al, 1977). The purpose of our second experiment was to investigate whether retrieval of a signal-generated memory is similarly impaired by a change in contextspecifically, by changing the attributes of the signal.…”

Section: Methodsmentioning

confidence: 99%

Contextual cues and the retrieval of competing memories of goal events

Haggbloom

Morris

1994

Animal Learning & Behavior

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In Experiment 1, four groups of rats were initially trained on a discrimination which established a stimulus as a signal for reinforcement. That signal was then presented during subsequent partial reinforcement training in a way that could potentially interfere with retrieval of the memory of nonreinforcement (SN) on the preceding trial either because (1) the storage and retrieval contexts for SN were different (retrieval failure hypothesis), or (2) the memory of reinforcement produced by the signal acted as a competing memory (competing memory hypothesis). Experiment 1 supported the competing memory hypothesis. In Experiment 2, we investigated the effect of stimulus change on the capacity of the context to retrieve a competing memory of a temporally remote reinforcement event with which the context was strongly associated. Retrieval of a competing memory was impaired by differences between the storage and retrieval contexts in a manner analogous to the effect of context on retrieval of a reinforcement event memory from' an immediately preceding trial.Memory retrieval is impaired if the constellation of stimuli present during retrieval (the retrieval context) is sufficiently different from that present at the time of storage (the storage context). This familiar contextual change effect is usually attributed to retrieval failure: the altered context lacks sufficient information for subjects to retrieve the target memory. Retrieval failure has been extensively investigated in animal learning (e.g., Capaldi, 1971, Experiment 4; Capaldi, Miller, Alptekin, Barry, & Haggbloom, 1991;Capaldi, Nawrocki, Miller, & Verry, 1986;Haggbloom, 1980; Jobe, Mellgren, Feinberg, Littlejohn, & Rigby, 1977;Spear, 1978).We report two experiments concerned with another basis for contextual change effects, whereby the altered context can serve as a signal to retrieve a competing memory if that context has been regularly associated with some event. This sort of contextual change effect has been less extensively investigated, especially in appetitive instrumental learning. Bouton and his associates (see, e.g., Bouton, 1991), however, have shown that certain interference effects in classical conditioning occur when the context retrieves a competing conditioned stimulus-unconditioned stimulus (CS-US) association. Similarly, Spear et al. (1980) reported impaired active and passive avoidance when the test context retrieved a competing memory.Haggbloom (1988) and Haggbloom, Lovelace, Brewer, Levins, and Owens (1990) recently reported contextual change effects in appetitive instrumental learning which they too attributed to competing memories. In those experiments, the target memories were occasioned by reinforcement (R) and nonreinforcement (N), denoted here Correspondence concerning this article should be addressed to S. J. as SR and SN, respectively. Retrieval of SR or SN on selected learning trials was inferred from resistance to extinction. To see how extinction provides this information, consider a conventional partial reinforcement situ...

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Memory retrieval and discrimination learning

Cited by 4 publications

References 11 publications

The sequential view: From rapidly fading stimulus traces to the organization of memory and the abstract concept of number

The sequential view: From rapidly fading stimulus traces to the organization of memory and the abstract concept of number

Tribute to E. J. Capaldi: Celebration of a Psychological Scientist

Contextual cues and the retrieval of competing memories of goal events

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