Abstract
Pigeons were trained in a gambling analogue procedure. At the start of a trial a bird was faced with a choice between a present “sure thing” (FR 30) and the opportunity to acquire a better condition of reinforcement (one or more FR 10s). The smaller ratios were given probabilistically following the gamble response. If the lower ratio did not occur a 1-min time-out was given. The FR 30 or FR 10 schedules were followed by time-out. The results show that pigeons chose the risky alternative more when the probability of FR 10 was high (.5) but the number of FRs given was small (one) than when the probability of a win was small (.1) with five FRs. An intermediate combination was similar to the.5 condition. In addition it was shown that when the chance of a win was small, immediate response contingent information about winning was important in maintaining choice for the risky alternative. In all conditions where the birds chose to gamble session length was substantially longer than under FR 30 without the opportunity to gamble.
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Kendall, S.B. An Animal Analogue of Gambling. Psychol Rec 37, 247–256 (1987). https://doi.org/10.1007/BF03394987
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/BF03394987