Biomedical subjects

W N Schoenfeld

Publications and source records attributed to W N Schoenfeld.

At least 19 recordsLinked to original sources

PubMed1981

Pain: a verbal response.

Definitions of pain have been ambiguous: sometimes it has been treated as a response; sometimes as a drive or state; and still other times as a stimulus variable. The medical-physiological study of pain has taken three routes: a search for a standard pain-causing stimulus; analysis of the neurological bases of pain; and, methods for alleviating pain. In contrast, it is argued here that the reality of pain resides solely in a subject's report of it. The verbal report is the product of social training, and in each society is shaped to conform with conventional models of pain. Accordingly, the principles and techniques of behavior modification ought to be applicable in the practical management of pain in psychological, medical, and other behavioral contexts.

Analgesia↗

PubMed1980

Effects of pharmacological autonomic blockade upon cardiac rate and blood pressure conditioned and unconditioned responses in Macaca mulatta.

Heart rate, systolic and diastolic blood pressures were recorded during classical delay conditioning of rhesus macaque monkeys. When portions of the autonomic nervous system were selectively blocked by pharmacological agents, it appeared that the initial increases in heart rate and blood pressures in response to the conditioned stimulus were the result of increased sympathetic activity and a concomitant decrease in parasympathetic activity. Towards the end of the conditioned stimulus, an increase in parasympathetic activity was indicated. Blockade of the autonomic system which produced total elimination of the conditioned cardiac rate response and substantial reduction or elimination of the conditioned blood pressure response, was not necessarily or always accompanied by a corresponding elimination of the respective unconditioned responses. Such a finding suggests a different underlying neural mediation of these conditioned and unconditioned responses.

Animals↗

PubMed1980

Classical conditioning of heart rate and blood pressure in Macaca mulatta.

Classical delay conditioning of heart rate, and of systolic and diastolic blood pressures, was carried out in 16 rhesus monkeys. Blood pressure and inter-systolic interval were measured from an in-dwelling arterial catheter; recordings were taken prior to conditioned stimulus (CS) on each trial, during a 20 sec visual stimulus that filled the conditioned-unconditioned stimulus (CS-UCS) interval, and following UCS (a brief electric tail-shock). The heart rate response both to CS and to UCS was biphasic (acceleration followed by deceleration); the blood pressure response functions were more complex, and were different for the CS and post-UCS periods. Comparison of the patterns of cardiac and blood pressure responses on any trial indicates a possible sequence of baroreceptor reflex activity.

Animals↗

PubMed1969

Disruption of a temporal discrimination under response-independent shock.

The responding of rats was reinforced on one key after a 1-sec auditory stimulus and on a second key after a 5-sec stimulus. With errors punished by a short timeout, all subjects achieved a high level of accuracy. A chain of responses during the stimuli mediated the performance so that when the auditory signals were omitted accuracy decreased only slightly. Response-independent aversive stimulation superimposed upon this procedure both suppressed the total amount of behavior and reduced the accuracy of the discriminative performance, the intensity of the stimulus determining the error rate. The increase in errors under these conditions may have depended in part upon differential suppression of members of the response chain, but such suppression was not necessary, since error rate increased even in its absence. Furthermore, the locus of response disruption within the chain was not consistent from day to day either for any individual animal or across animals.

Animals↗

PubMed1968