A three-stimulus midsession reversal task in pigeons with visual and spatial discriminative stimuli

Abstract

In a two-stimulus visual discrimination task with a reversal in reward contingencies midway through each session, pigeons produce a surprising number of both anticipatory (i.e., before the reversal) and perseverative (i.e., after the reversal) errors. In the current work, we examined pigeons’ (Columba livia) patterns of responding on a 90-trial, three-stimulus visual or spatial discrimination task with two changes in reward contingency (one after Trial 30 and one after Trial 60) during each session. On probe sessions where pecking the first-correct stimulus was rewarded for the first 60 rather than 30 trials, pigeons on a spatial discrimination pecked the first-correct stimulus until it was no longer rewarded, while visual discrimination birds ceased responding to the first-correct stimulus even while it was still being rewarded. On probe sessions where the onset of the first trial was delayed 7 min, pigeons’ performance on the visual discrimination was disrupted by the interval delay, but performance in the spatial condition was more similar to baseline. Pigeons use different strategies (temporal control vs. local reinforcement) on midsession reversal tasks with visual versus spatial stimuli, suggesting that they are selectively permeable to changes in information (global vs. local reinforcement rates).