Abstract
In two experiments, rats solved two concurrent discrimination problems in which one stimulus (i.e., a facilitator) signaled the reinforcement of another stimulus (i.e., a target). Then a transfer test assessed the capacity of facilitators trained in one problem to promote responding to targets trained in the other. Experiment 1 found that a facilitator promoted as much responding to such a transfer target as to the target with which it was originally trained. Transfer was not obtained with a pseudofacilitator that was uninformative, in training, about the reinforcement of its target. Experiment 2 manipulated the stimulus modality of the targets and facilitators. Its results indicated that transfer performance was not due to generalization between training and transfer targets or facilitators. These results parallel those from comparable autoshaping paradigms with pigeons, and they agree with the view that facilitators promote responding by lowering the threshold for activation of the US representation.
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This work was supported by Grant BNS-8308176 from the National Science Foundation and Grant T32 MH 17168 from the National Institute of Mental Health. This work was conducted while the first author was a postdoctoral researcher with the Department of Psychology and the Institute of Neurological Sciences at the University of Pennsylvania.
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Davidson, T.L., Rescorla, R.A. Transfer of facilitation in the rat. Animal Learning & Behavior 14, 380–386 (1986). https://doi.org/10.3758/BF03200082
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.3758/BF03200082