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PubMed1982

Choice and behavioral patterning.

Ten pigeons pecked left and right keys in a discrete-trials experiment in which access to food was contingent upon changeovers to the right key after particular runs of left-key pecks. In each of three sets of conditions, two run lengths were reinforced according to a concurrent variable-interval schedule: reinforcement followed runs of either 1 or 2, 1 or 4, or 2 or 4 left-key pecks preceding changeovers. The intertrial interval separating successive pecks was varied from .5 to 10.0 sec, and the relative frequency of reinforcement for the shorter of the two reinforced runs was varied from 0 to .75. The contingencies established local behavioral patterning that roughly approximated that required for reinforcement. For a fixed pair of reinforced run lengths, preference for the shorter of the two frequently increased as the intertrial interval increased and therefore as the minimum temporal durations of both reinforced runs increased. Preference for the shorter of the two also increased as its corresponding relative frequency of reinforcement increased. Both of these effects on preference were qualitatively similar to corresponding effects in previous research with two different kinds of reinforced behavioral patterns, interresponse times and interchangeover times. In all these experiments, analytical units were found in the temporal patterns of behavior, not in the behavior immediately contiguous with a reinforcer. It is suggested that a particular local temporal pattern of behavior is established to the extent to which it is repeatedly remembered when reinforcers are delivered, regardless of whether the delivery of a reinforcer is explicitly contingent upon that pattern.

Journal Article↗
PubMed1979

Medically-related absenteeism: random or motivated behavior?

The present study examined alternative measures of absence proneness related to organizationally-defined measures of absenteeism. A typical distinction among various types of absences is to separate medically-related absences from other types, since medically-related absences are believed to reflect random or unsystematic causes of behavior rather than voluntary choice behavior of the employee. The present study defined absence proneness as the degree to which individuals repeat their behavior. Three years of absence data for a sample of employees from one company were examined to discover the degree of absence proneness present in organizationally-defined forms of medically-related and voluntary absenteeism. In addition, a survey was administered to the sample to measure employee perceptions of work and non-work-related factors which were believed to be motivational determinants of absenteeism. A multiple discriminant analysis was developed in an attempt to classify employees to a survey designed to measure motivational determinants of absenteeism. The classification results supported the view that medically-related absenteeism has motivational determinants related to employee work and non-work preferences. Implications for management are discussed.

Absenteeism↗
PubMed1992

Levels of aggregation and the generalized matching law.

Concurrent operant behavior is often described using molar response tendencies measured over many sessions. In contrast, other models relate the allocation of behavior to momentary or molecular processes that operate over shorter periods. In this article, a formal model of the statistical properties of molecular behavioral matching is developed. Molar matching is the result when many individual bouts of responding are aggregated. However, behavioral allocation at the molecular level will differ from the molar result. The model indicates that aggregation effects should be controlled in analyses of matching and that the comparison of molecular theories of concurrent operant behavior with molecular models of matching performance affords ideographic analyses of choice behavior.

Animals↗
PubMed1999

Relative roles of the S cell network and parallel interneuronal pathways in the whole-body shortening reflex of the medicinal leech.

The whole-body shortening reflex of the medicinal leech Hirudo medicinalis is a withdrawal response produced by anterior mechanical stimuli. The interneuronal pathways underlying this reflex consist of the S cell network (a chain of electrically coupled interneurons) and a set of other, parallel pathways. We used a variety of techniques to characterize these interneuronal pathways further, including intracellular stimulation of the S cell network, photoablation of the S cell axon, and selective lesions of particular connectives (the axon bundles that link adjacent ganglia in the leech nerve cord). These experiments demonstrated that the S cell network is neither sufficient nor necessary for the production of the shortening reflex. The axons of the parallel pathways were localized to the lateral connectives (whereas the S cell axon runs through the medial connective). We used physiological techniques to show that the axons of the parallel pathways have a larger diameter in the anterior connective and to demonstrate that the parallel pathways are activated selectively by anterior mechanosensory stimuli. We also presented correlative evidence that the parallel pathways, along with activating motor neurons during shortening, are responsible for inhibiting a higher-order "command-like" interneuron in the neuronal circuit for swimming, thus playing a role in the behavioral choice between swimming and shortening.

Animals↗
PubMed1977

Interpersonal distance behavior of mentally retarded and nonretarded children.

The investigators compared interpersonal-distance choice behavior of 60 mildly retarded children and 60 nonretarded children of comparable MAs to a male adult stranger. Contrary to the original prediction, stemming from Zigler's negative-reaction tendency formulation, interpersonal distance by retarded children was not generally different from that of nonretarded children. However, analysis of the interaction between IQ group and approach condition (child approaching adult or adult approaching child) indicated that retarded children preferred greater distance from the approaching adult than did nonretarded children. This result raises the possibility that perception of lessened personal control by retarded children stimulated a stronger avoidance reaction.

Adolescent↗
PubMed1980

Comparative studies of squirrel monkeys (Saimiri) and titi monkeys (Callicebus) in travel tasks.

Squirrel and titi monkeys were observed in a series of experiments in which the subjects' task was to move to a distant goal along above-ground pathways. The pathways were entirely visible to the subjects in all experiments. However, visual cues along the pathways (in Experiment I) and physical and spatial properties of the pathways (in Experiments II and III) were varied systematically in order to determine what effect features had upon selection of travel paths for monkeys of each species. Marked performance differences between the species were evident in these experiments, including differences in latency to move past the choice point, proportion of trials in which the shortest route was chosen first, and changes over test sessions in frequency of initial choice of the shortest route. In particular, titis tended to move past the choice point more slowly than squirrel monkeys; to pay more attention to distant properties of the pathways prior to making a decision, especially after experience in the test setting; and to prefer habitual pathways when these were available, whereas squirrel monkeys preferred novel routes when these were available. The relative "optimality" of decision making in these tasks in relation to species-typical modes of traveling and foraging in natural habitats is discussed. An alternative view of decision making, in which optimality is not assumed to be the only decision-making strategy, is suggested as an appropriate vehicle for further investigation into the sources of short-term variability in choice behavior.

Animals↗
PubMed2005

Ranking of memories and behavioral strategies in the radial maze.

New features of actual choice behavior and effortful information processing in rats were demonstrated in an eight-arm radial maze through modifications of a matching-to-sample task. Two attempts were allowed for a squad of hooded Sprague-Dawley rats (n=7) for finding a reward in a testing phase of the task. The results showed flexibility and sooner learning to matching rule on the second testing attempt that was only later followed by an improvement of choice accuracy on the first attempt. "Hidden learning" on the second attempt could reflect memories and behavioral strategy, which were present, but not expressed on the first choice. The hypothesis was advanced that learning expressed on the second attempt reflects encoding of a matching rule, whereas improvement on the first choice reflects changes in the rank of acquired memories and behavioral strategy. A second experiment on the same squad of rats tested the ability of trained animals to rank already acquired memories. Following the introduction of the second sample to the study phase of the task, the rats learned to prefer to match the first sample in the testing phase, rearranging ranks of stored memories under the internal control of win-stay strategy. Alternative explanations of interference, trace decay and ranking were compared in order to account for the present results.

Animals↗
PubMed2002

Sensitivity of children's behavior to probabilistic reward: effects of a decreasing-ratio lottery system on math performance.

Probabilistic reward has been shown to affect children's choice behavior in game-like activities. We examined the effects of a lottery system containing progressively lower exchange ratios on children's completion of math problems. Two of the 3 children completed problems above baseline levels until the chance of exchange dropped to 25%. This study describes a potentially useful method for examining reinforcement schedules in applied settings and extends previous research on probabilities of reinforcement.

Achievement↗
PubMed2004

Decisions from experience and the effect of rare events in risky choice.

When people have access to information sources such as newspaper weather forecasts, drug-package inserts, and mutual-fund brochures, all of which provide convenient descriptions of risky prospects, they can make decisions from description. When people must decide whether to back up their computer's hard drive, cross a busy street, or go out on a date, however, they typically do not have any summary description of the possible outcomes or their likelihoods. For such decisions, people can call only on their own encounters with such prospects, making decisions from experience. Decisions from experience and decisions from description can lead to dramatically different choice behavior. In the case of decisions from description, people make choices as if they overweight the probability of rare events, as described by prospect theory. We found that in the case of decisions from experience, in contrast, people make choices as if they underweight the probability of rare events, and we explored the impact of two possible causes of this underweighting--reliance on relatively small samples of information and overweighting of recently sampled information. We conclude with a call for two different theories of risky choice.

Choice Behavior↗
PubMed1994

Delay reduction and optimal foraging: variable-ratio search in a foraging analogue.

The present study investigated conditions under which the conditioned reinforcement principles of delay-reduction theory and views based on simple maximization of reinforcement rate make ordinally opposing predictions with respect to foraging-related choice behavior. The use of variable-ratio schedules in the choice phase also represents an extension of delay-reduction theory to schedules that may better mimic the effort involved in searching. Pigeons responded on modified concurrent-chains schedules in which equal variable-ratio schedules led to unequal variable-interval outcomes and unequal reinforcer amounts. All 4 subjects completed a minimum of two replications of conditions for which the predictions of delay-reduction theory and a simple rate-maximizing theory were opposed. Results were consistent with delay reduction's ordinal predictions in 11 of 11 replications of the divergent predictions favoring the smaller, more immediate alternative. The predictions of rate maximization were upheld only when they were consistent with those of delay reduction. Results are discussed in terms of conditioned reinforcement, sensitivity to reductions in delay to food, and possible rules of thumb that may be useful in characterizing foraging.

Animals↗
PubMed1996

Procrastination by pigeons: preference for larger, more delayed work requirements.

In three experiments, pigeons chose between alternatives that required the completion of a small ratio schedule early in the trial or a larger ratio schedule later in the trial. Completion of the ratio requirement did not lead to an immediate reinforcer, but simply allowed the events of the trial to continue. In Experiment 1, the ratio requirements interrupted periods in which food was delivered on a variable-time schedule. In Experiments 2 and 3, each ratio requirement was preceded and followed by a delay, and only one reinforcer was delivered, at the end of each trial. Two of the experiments used an adjusting-ratio procedure in which the ratio requirement was increased and decreased over trials so as to estimate an indifference point--a ratio size at which the two alternatives were chosen about equally often. These experiments found clear evidence for "procrastination"--the choice of a larger but more delayed response requirement. In some cases, subjects chose the more delayed ratio schedule even when it was larger than the more immediate alternative by a factor of four or more. The results suggest that as the delay to the start of a ratio requirement is increased, it has progressively less effect on choice behavior, in much the same way that delaying a positive reinforcer reduces it effect on choice.

Animals↗
PubMed1985

Postreinforcement signal processing.

Postreinforcement signal processing by rats was demonstrated in six experiments that used a discrete-trials choice procedure. Experiment 1 assessed the extent to which rats are able to transfer knowledge about associations between postreinforcement signal durations and choice responses to conditions where a particular signal duration preceded the opportunity to make a choice response. In Experiment 2 the generality of the transfer effect was demonstrated by using both signal duration and signal modality as relevant stimulus attributes for the postreinforcement signals. The role of the relative durations of the reinforcement-signal gap and the intertrial interval was investigated in Experiment 3. In order to assess the effects of within-trial and between-trial signal relations on the acquisition of a temporal discrimination, both pre-and postreinforcement signals were presented on each trial in Experiments 4 and 5. The effects of pre- and postreinforcement signal relations on the steady-state performance of a temporal bisection task across three different signal ranges were studied in Experiment 6. The conclusion is that rats readily process various stimulus attributes of postreinforcement signals and that relations between postreinforcement signals, choice responses, and prereinforcement signals are major determinants of choice behavior.

Animals↗
PubMed2003

Assumed policy similarity and voter preference.

The effects of attitude similarity on voters' preferences were examined. Using secondary analyses, the authors created measures of assumed similarity across 6 issues between voters and U.S. presidential candidates (in 1972). Greater similarity was associated with greater attraction (operationalized in terms of voters' presidential preferences). In 2 independent analyses, perceived similarity resulted in predictive accuracy of 84% to 88%. In a 3rd analysis, the predictive efficiency of each of 6 similarity measures was determined and used to develop a model that accurately predicted voters' actions in a hold-out sample. Findings demonstrate the importance of perceived attitude similarity in determining voter preferences and suggest the utility of earlier similarity-attraction research for the development of models of policy choice behavior.

Attitude↗
PubMed1981

Optimization theory fails to predict performance of pigeons in a two-response situation.

Optimization theory states that organisms behave in a way that maximizes reinforcement or "value." In a two-response situation, pigeons' response proportions approximately equaled reinforcement proportions, even when this behavior pattern substantially decreased the rate of reinforcement. Optimization or reinforcement maximization was not supported as the basic mechanism underlying choice behavior.

Animals↗
PubMed1996

[Behavioral consistency when parents drive their children to preschool].

How drivers signal, park, escort their children across a street to a preschool, and depart was videotaped unobtrusively for 39 days, to test for consistency of driver behavior and children's crossing behavior. Data were analyzed for 17 pairs of drivers and children, observed more than ten times under identical conditions. Frequency of identical actions was analyzed on the basis of category systems, whereby a sequence of behavior was broken down into several items. A variety of individual differences and inter-behavioral differences in consistency were detected, and in general drivers were more consistent than children. Drivers' signals and accompanying of children were somewhat inconsistent, while some of their choice behaviors were very stable. Inconsistent behavior was discussed in terms of the lack of or insufficient specification of drivers' and children's schemas. Repeated naturalistic observation can not only identify behavioral consistency and reveal the structure of relevant schemas in daily life but also can predict behavior.

Adult↗
PubMed2001

Correlated firing in macaque visual area MT: time scales and relationship to behavior.

We studied the simultaneous activity of pairs of neurons recorded with a single electrode in visual cortical area MT while monkeys performed a direction discrimination task. Previously, we reported the strength of interneuronal correlation of spike count on the time scale of the behavioral epoch (2 sec) and noted its potential impact on signal pooling (Zohary et al., 1994). We have now examined correlation at longer and shorter time scales and found that pair-wise cross-correlation was predominantly short term (10-100 msec). Narrow, central peaks in the spike train cross-correlograms were largely responsible for correlated spike counts on the time scale of the behavioral epoch. Longer-term (many seconds to minutes) changes in the responsiveness of single neurons were observed in auto-correlations; however, these slow changes in time were on average uncorrelated between neurons. Knowledge of the limited time scale of correlation allowed the derivation of a more efficient metric for spike count correlation based on spike timing information, and it also revealed a potential relative advantage of larger neuronal pools for shorter integration times. Finally, correlation did not depend on the presence of the visual stimulus or the behavioral choice of the animal. It varied little with stimulus condition but was stronger between neurons with similar direction tuning curves. Taken together, our results strengthen the view that common input, common stimulus selectivity, and common noise are tightly linked in functioning cortical circuits.

Action Potentials↗
PubMed1996

Psychological antecedents of escalation behavior: effects of choice, responsibility, and decision consequences.

Research on escalation behavior has proposed that choice of an initial course of action, responsibility for decision outcomes, and negative decision consequences are necessary conditions for the escalation effect to occur. This proposition was tested in a sample of 257 undergraduates. Results show that although responsibility and negative decision consequences contribute to the escalation effect, they are not necessary conditions for escalation to occur. Escalation is also observed when a choice is overruled, and there are positive consequences for the implemented course of action. The escalation bias is greatest when the consequences are inconsistent with participants' expectations. These results are consistent with a self-justification explanation.

Adult↗