Abstract
Female human subjects received either one, five, or nine tone-light compound stimulus presentations followed without interruption by presentations of tone alone. Task subjects were instructed to make a reaction time response to onset of the light stimulus. Control groups made no RT responses. The effect of omission of the light on the orienting response was evaluated by examining magnitude of GSRs to tone stimulus onset. In groups that performed the RT task, GSRs to stimulus change (compound to simple) were found to be a function of the number of trials prior to stimulus change. This was not the case when subjects had not performed the RT task. The RT task itself was demonstrated to affect GSR magnitude and frequency. It was concluded that the behavioral significance of the stimulus and the number of significant stimuli previously presented to the subjects directly affected GSR magnitude to stimulus change.
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This research was supported in part by a University Council. Fellowship for the rust author. The paper is sponsored by Dr. H. D. Kimmel. who takes full editorial responsibility for its contents.
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Ray, R.L., Piroch, J.F. Orienting responses to a change in stimulus significance. Bull. Psychon. Soc. 8, 82–84 (1976). https://doi.org/10.3758/BF03335086
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.3758/BF03335086