Two mothers of deviant young children were instructed to count their episodes of attention to appropriate child behavior in their homes, using wrist counters. Attention and appropriate child behavior were defined before counting began. Independent observations of parent-child interactions showed that, for each mother-child pair, the percentage of maternal attention given following appropriate child behavior increased, as did the child's appropriate behavior. Removal of the counters did not produce a reversal of the behaviors; instead the increased level stabilized. One mother was then instructed to count her attention to inappropriate child behavior and to decrease it. This instruction had little effect on her attention, and her child's behavior did not change. When both parents were again instructed to count their episodes of attention to appropriate behavior, further improvements in both mothers, and in their children resulted. These results were obtained despite inaccurate parent self-recording. Follow-up observations made over the next five months showed these behavioral gains to be durable. A third parent and his child were unaffected by this training procedure. Thus, there are instances in which self-recording may function as an effective and economical parent-training technique for effecting improvements in child behavior.

Impactions are the most common problem affecting the small colon in horses and are much more prevalent in ponies and miniature horses. Ventral midline laparotomy under general anaesthesia is the standard of care for this condition when medical management fails to resolve the impaction or when the impaction causes complete intraluminal obstruction and tympany. This case series reports the use of standing flank laparotomy (SFL) in 15 ponies with focal small colon impactions and one large breed horse with an elongated small colon impaction. All cases presented with signs of colic of 1-4 days' duration. The horses were initially vigorously treated with both enteral and parental fluids but failed to pass faeces, with no resolution of abdominal distention or pain. In all cases, a definitive diagnosis was made during SFL and the small colon appeared to be viable. The impaction was resolved by extraluminal massage. In the horse and in one pony, in addition to extraluminal massage, high enema was administered during surgery. Routine perioperative treatment with fluids, analgesics, antimicrobials and wound care was provided. All animals survived to discharge. The time from surgical resolution of the impaction to passing faeces was less than 2 h in all but one case. Median duration of hospitalisation was 2 days and all animals returned to their original use by 2 months. The encouraging results of this case series suggest that SFL is a viable alternative to ventral laparotomy for ponies and horses with either focal SCI or extensive SCI.

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Summary Eight horses with varying degrees of burns sustained in an Australian bushfire were treated over several months. The horses were attended at the scene of the fire and then hospitalised from 4 days to 4 months for burns sustained to the head, ventral body and legs. The clinical findings and treatment of two of the horses are described. Variations with barn fire injuries and treatment are noted. While some horses were subject to euthanasia, or died at the scene of the fire, all hospitalised horses recovered.

Two-key concurrent responding was maintained for three pigeons by a single variableinterval 1-minute schedule of reinforcement in conjunction with a random number generator that assigned feeder operations between keys with equal probability. The duration of blackouts was varied between keys when each response initiated a blackout, and grain arranged by the variable-interval schedule was automatically presented after a blackout (Exp. I). In Exp. II every key peck, except for those that produced grain, initiated a blackout, and grain was dependent upon a response following a blackout. For each pigeon in Exp. I and for one pigeon in Exp. II, the relative frequency of responding on a key approximated, i.e., matched, the relative reciprocal of the duration of the blackout interval on that key. In a third experiment, blackouts scheduled on a variable-interval were of equal duration on the two keys. For one key, grain automatically followed each blackout; for the other key, grain was dependent upon a response and never followed a blackout. The relative frequency of responding on the former key, i.e., the delay key, better approximated the negative exponential function obtained by Chung (1965) than the matching function predicted by Chung and Herrnstein (1967).Chung and Herrnstein (1967) found, in a two-key concurrent variable-interval (VI) schedule, that the relative frequency of responding on one key matched the relative immediacy of reinforcement on that key. That is, the proportion of the total number of responses emitted on one key approximated the relative reciprocal of the duration of the blackout preceding grain on that key, i.e., (l/dL)/(l/dL+ l/dR), where dL and dR were the durations of the blackouts preceding grain on the left and right keys respectively. In the Chung and Herrnstein study, reinforcers were .arranged for both keys on identical, independent, VI 1-min schedules. When a feeder operation was primed for a peck on a key, the 'This research was conducted while the writer was the recipient of a NDEA Title IV predoctoral fellowship and is based upon a dissertation submitted to the Department of Psychology, University of Utah, in partial fulfillment of the requirements for the Ph.D. degree. The writer would like to thank Dr. Charles P.Shimp for his invaluable counsel and suggestions during the course of this research and the preparation of this manuscript. The writer is also indebted to Dr. David G. Born who provided, through NIMH grant #MH 10864, the equipment and subjects for these experiments. Revision feeder was automatically presented following a response-initiated blackout, the duration of which varied between keys. Shimp (1969, Exp. II) replicated a portion of Chung and Herrnstein's study with one difference: when a reinforcer was assigned for a peck on a key, one response on that key initiated a blackout, and the next response on that key (after the blackout) was immediately reinforced. As in the earlier study, the relative frequency of responding on a key matched the relative immediacy of rei...