Abstract
It has been suggested that the avoidance performance of animals trained under a combined discontinuous/continuous shock procedure would be superior to that of animals trained under standard discontinuous shock procedure. The present study indicates that animals receiving, alternately, continuous or discontinuous shock on escape trials, exhibit shorter escape response latencies and better avoidance acquisition than animals trained under standard discontinuous shock for all escape trials. Under the combined discontinuous/continuous shock procedure, avoidance responses occur earlier and more frequently in escape-avoidance training as escape responses to the US become more efficient in topography and shorter in latency.
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DAMATO, M. R., KELLER, D., & DiCARA, L. Facilitation of discriminated avoidance learning by discontinuous shock. Journal of Comparative & Physiological Psychology, 1964, 58, 344–349.
HESS, J. H., & SHAFER, J. N. Discontinuous shock and generalization to the preshock period in discriminated avoidance learning. Psychonomic Science, 1968, 10, 175–176.
HESS, J. H., & SHAFER, J. N. Escape response distribution and discriminated avoidance of discontinuous shock. Psychonomic Science, 1968, 11, 255–256.
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Supported in part by United States Public Health Service Grant MH 11634-02.
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Shafer, J.N., Hess, J.H. Discrimination avoidance learning with alternate discontinuous and continuous US escape trials. Psychon Sci 14, 237–238 (1969). https://doi.org/10.3758/BF03332814
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.3758/BF03332814