Skip to main content
Download PDF

The effect of subadditive pretraining on blocking: Limits on generalization

Learning & Behavior volume 36, pages 341–351 (2008)Cite this article

Abstract

Recent evidence indicates that prior learning about a set of cues may determine how new cues are processed. If subjects are taught that two reliable predictors of an outcome do not summate when the cues are presented together (i.e., subadditive pretraining), the subjects will tend to show a less profound blocking effect when trained with different cues. Three experiments investigated the conditions necessary for subadditive pretraining to generalize to new cues. Experiment 1 demonstrated that subadditive pretraining is less effective in reducing blocking when it is experienced in a context other than that in which the blocking training is experienced. In Experiment 2, the effectiveness of subadditive pretraining waned with time. Experiment 3 showed that subadditive pretraining is more effective when the temporal characteristics of pretraining cues are similar to those of the cues used in blocking training. These results provide information concerning the conditions under which learning will generalize from one set of cues to another.

References

  • Alvarado, M. C., & Rudy, J. W. (1992). Some properties of configural learning: An investigation of the transverse-patterning problem. Journal of Experimental Psychology: Animal Behavior Processes, 18, 145–153.

    Article  PubMed  Google Scholar 

  • Beckers, T., De Houwer, J., Pineño, O., & Miller, R. R. (2005). Outcome additivity and outcome maximality influence cue competition in human causal learning. Journal of Experimental Psychology: Learning, Memory, & Cognition, 31, 238–249.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Beckers, T., Miller, R. R., De Houwer, J., & Urushihara, K. (2006). Reasoning rats: Forward blocking in Pavlovian animal conditioning is sensitive to constraints of causal inference. Journal of Experimental Psychology: General, 135, 92–102.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Bouton, M. E. (1993). Context, time, and memory retrieval in the interference paradigms of Pavlovian learning. Psychological Bulletin, 114, 80–99.

    Article  PubMed  Google Scholar 

  • Bouton, M. E., & King, D. A. (1983). Contextual control of the extinction of conditioned fear: Tests for the associative value of the context. Journal of Experimental Psychology: Animal Behavior Processes, 9, 248–265.

    Article  PubMed  Google Scholar 

  • De Houwer, J., & Beckers, T. (2003). Secondary task difficulty modulates forward blocking in human contingency learning. Quarterly Journal of Experimental Psychology, 56B, 345–357.

    Google Scholar 

  • De Houwer, J., Beckers, T., & Glautier, S. (2002). Outcome and cue properties modulate blocking. Quarterly Journal of Experimental Psychology, 55A, 965–985.

    Google Scholar 

  • De Houwer, J., Vandorpe, S., & Beckers, T. (2005). On the role of controlled cognitive processes in human associative learning. In A. J. Wills (Ed.), New directions in human associative learning (pp. 41–63). Mahwah, NJ: Erlbaum.

    Google Scholar 

  • Escobar, M., & Miller, R. R. (2003). Timing in retroactive interference. Learning & Behavior, 31, 257–272.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Estes, W. K. (1950). Toward a statistical theory of learning. Psychological Review, 57, 94–107.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Gentner, D. (2003). Why we’re so smart. In D. Gentner & S. Goldin-Meadow (Eds.), Language in mind: Advances in the study of language and thought (pp. 195–235). Cambridge, MA: MIT Press.

    Google Scholar 

  • Godden, D. R., & Baddeley, A. D. (1975). Context-dependent memory in two natural environments: On land and underwater. British Journal of Psychology, 66, 325–331.

    Google Scholar 

  • Hall, G., & Honey, R. C. (1989). Contextual effects in conditioning, latent inhibition, and habituation: Associative and retrieval functions of contextual cues. Journal of Experimental Psychology: Animal Behavior Processes, 15, 232–241.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Hall, G., & Honey, R. C. (1990). Context-specific conditioning in the conditioned-emotional-response procedure. Journal of Experimental Psychology: Animal Behavior Processes, 16, 271–278.

    Article  PubMed  Google Scholar 

  • Hinchy, J., Lovibond, P. F., & Ter-Horst, K. M. (1995). Blocking in human electrodermal conditioning. Quarterly Journal of Experimental Psychology, 48B, 2–12.

    Google Scholar 

  • Holland, P. C. (1992). Occasion setting in Pavlovian conditioning. In D. L. Medin (Ed.), The psychology of learning and motivation (Vol. 28, pp. 69–125). San Diego: Academic Press.

    Google Scholar 

  • Kamin, L. J. (1968). “Attention-like” processes in classical conditioning. In M. R. Jones (Ed.), Miami Symposium on the Prediction of Behavior: Aversive stimulation (pp. 9–31). Miami, FL: University of Miami Press.

    Google Scholar 

  • Lachnit, H., Kimmel, H., Bevill, M., Martin, I., Levey, A., & Hamm, A. (1990). Classical conditioning with human subjects. In P. J. D. Drenth, J. A. Sergeant, & R. J. Takens (Eds.), European perspectives in psychology: Vol. 1. Theoretical, psychometrics, personality, developmental, educational, cognitive, gerontological (pp. 353–368). Chichester, U.K.: Wiley.

    Google Scholar 

  • Livesey, E. J., & Boakes, R. A. (2004). Outcome additivity, elemental processing and blocking in human causality judgements. Quarterly Journal of Experimental Psychology, 57B, 361–379.

    Google Scholar 

  • Lovibond, P. F., Preston, G. C., & Mackintosh, N. J. (1984). Context specificity of conditioning, extinction, and latent inhibition. Journal of Experimental Psychology: Animal Behavior Processes, 10, 360–375.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Melchers, K. G., Shanks, D. R., & Lachnit, H. (2008). Stimulus coding in human associative learning: Flexible representations of parts and wholes. Behavioural Processes, 77, 413–427.

    PubMed  Google Scholar 

  • Melchers, K. G., Üngör, M., & Lachnit, H. (2005). The experimental task influences cue competition in human causal learning. Journal of Experimental Psychology: Animal Behavior Processes, 31, 477–483.

    Article  PubMed  Google Scholar 

  • Miller, R. R., & Matzel, L. D. (1988). The comparator hypothesis: A response rule for the expression of associations. In G. H. Bower (Ed.), The psychology of learning and motivation (Vol. 22, pp. 51–92). New York: Academic Press.

    Google Scholar 

  • Mitchell, C. J., & Lovibond, P. F. (2002). Backward and forward blocking in human electrodermal conditioning: Blocking requires an assumption of outcome additivity. Quarterly Journal of Experimental Psychology, 55B, 311–329.

    Google Scholar 

  • Pearce, J. M. (1994). Similarity and discrimination: A selective review and a connectionist model. Psychological Review, 101, 587–607.

    Article  PubMed  Google Scholar 

  • Pearce, J. M., & Hall, G. (1980). A model for Pavlovian learning: Variations in the effectiveness of conditioned but not of unconditioned stimuli. Psychological Review, 87, 532–552.

    Article  PubMed  Google Scholar 

  • Pellón, R., & Montaño, J. M. G. (1990). Conditioned stimuli as determinants of blocking in human electrodermal conditioning. In P. J. D. Drenth, J. A. Sergeant, & R. J. Takens (Eds.), European perspectives in psychology: Vol. 2. Clinical, health, stress and anxiety, neuropsychology, psychophysiology (pp. 409–423). Chichester, U.K.: Wiley.

    Google Scholar 

  • Rescorla, R. A., & Wagner, A. R. (1972). A theory of Pavlovian conditioning: Variations in the effectiveness of reinforcement and nonreinforcement. In A. H. Black & W. F. Prokasy (Eds.), Classical conditioning II: Current research and theory (pp. 64–99). New York: Appleton-Century-Crofts.

    Google Scholar 

  • Riccio, D. C., Ackil, J., & Burch-Vernon, A. (1992). Forgetting of stimulus attributes: Methodological implications for assessing associative phenomena. Psychological Bulletin, 112, 433–445.

    Article  PubMed  Google Scholar 

  • Riccio, D. C., Richardson, R., & Ebner, D. L. (1984). Memory retrieval deficits based upon altered contextual cues: A paradox. Psychological Bulletin, 96, 152–165.

    Article  PubMed  Google Scholar 

  • Shanks, D. R., & Dickinson, A. (1987). Associative accounts of causality judgment. In G. H. Bower (Ed.), The psychology of learning and motivation (Vol. 21, pp. 229–261). New York: Academic Press.

    Google Scholar 

  • Williams, D. A., & Braker, D. S. (1999). Influence of past experience on the coding of compound stimuli. Journal of Experimental Psychology: Animal Behavior Processes, 25, 461–474.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Williams, D. A., & Braker, D. S. (2002). Input coding in animal and human associative learning. Behavioural Processes, 57, 149–161.

    Article  PubMed  Google Scholar 

  • Williams, D. A., Sagness, K. E., & McPhee, J. E. (1994). Configural and elemental strategies in predictive learning. Journal of Experimental Psychology: Learning, Memory, & Cognition, 20, 694–709.

    Article  Google Scholar 

Download references

Author information

Affiliations

  1. State University of New York, Binghamton, New York

    Daniel S. Wheeler & Ralph R. Miller

  2. University of Leuven, Leuven, Belgium

    Tom Beckers

Authors
  1. Daniel S. Wheeler
    View author publications

    You can also search for this author in PubMed Google Scholar

  2. Tom Beckers
    View author publications

    You can also search for this author in PubMed Google Scholar

  3. Ralph R. Miller
    View author publications

    You can also search for this author in PubMed Google Scholar

Corresponding author

Correspondence to Ralph R. Miller.

Additional information

NIMH Grant 33881 provided support for this research. Tom Beckers is a postdoctoral fellow of the Research Foundation-Flanders (FWO). We thank Jeffrey C. Amundson, Jonah Grossman, David Guez, Rachael Hessner, Olga Lipatova, Alyssa Orinstein, Gonzalo Urcelay, Kouji Urushihara, and James Witnauer for comments on an earlier version of the article. In addition, we are indebted to Jim Esposito for his aid in collecting the data.

Rights and permissions

Reprints and Permissions

About this article

Cite this article

Wheeler, D.S., Beckers, T. & Miller, R.R. The effect of subadditive pretraining on blocking: Limits on generalization. Learning & Behavior 36, 341–351 (2008). https://doi.org/10.3758/LB.36.4.341

Download citation

  • Received:

  • Accepted:

  • Issue Date:

  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.3758/LB.36.4.341

Keywords

  • Test Trial
  • Retention Interval
  • Suppression Ratio
  • Animal Behavior Process
  • Associative Theory