Abstract
The purpose of the present experiment was to determine if pigeons would obtain time-out from stimuli associated with independent schedules of intermittent food and electric shock presentation. Few time-outs were obtained from any of the shock-correlated stimuli, but when reinforcement and shock contingencies were removed during one stimulus, i.e., during an extinction component of a multiple schedule, all subjects obtained a large and consistent amount of time-out. A clear correlation between time-out and behavioral contrast, which occurred when one component of the multiple schedule was correlated with extinction but not when it was correlated with shock, was obtained. While the absence of time-outs during shock-correlated stimuli could be explained as generalization of punishment to the time-out key, the present findings might suggest that the time-out response is an unreliable index of stimulus aversiveness.
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The authors would like to thank James Starkey for help with the design and construction of the electroshock device.
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Hittesdorf, W.M., Richards, R.W. The absence of time-out responding by pigeons during shock-correlated stimuli. Bull. Psychon. Soc. 5, 9–12 (1975). https://doi.org/10.3758/BF03336683
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.3758/BF03336683