Abstract
Three groups of rats in three related experiments were used to test the effect of allowing withdrawal from the empty end box on the nonreinforced trials of a partial reinforcement runway situation. During acquisition the rats in one partial reinforcement group were permitted to retrace on the nonreinforced trials, whereas rats in the other partial reinforcement group were not. This no-retrace group and a continuous reinforcement group served as controls. In a well-differentiated alley in Experiment 1, the retrace group ran significantly slower during acquisition than both control groups. In Experiment 2 the runway response was subdivided into start, alley, and goal speeds and the retrace group ran slower in each section. Alley cues and extra-maze cues were removed in Experiment 3, which eliminated inhibition in the retrace group. When retracing from nonrein for cement is permitted this response appears to compete with reinforced approach, but only in a well-differentiated alley when withdrawal from nonreinforcement clearly occurs in a direction opposite to approach.
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Experiment 1 was reported by M. Ray Denny at the Midwestern Psychological Association meeting, Chicago, 1977. Experiments 2 and 3 are based on part of a dissertation submitted by C. Merle Johnson in partial fulfillment of the requirements for the PhD degree at Michigan State University
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Johnson, C.M., Denny, M.R. Inhibition of Performance as a Function of Withdrawal from Nonreinforcement in a Partial Reinforcement Situation. Psychol Rec 32, 315–327 (1982). https://doi.org/10.1007/BF03394791
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/BF03394791