Discrimination learning in the canary.

Pastore, Nicholas

doi:10.1037/h0061081

Cited by 28 publications

(13 citation statements)

References 5 publications

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“…There is evidence from a variety of species that an increase in the number of incorrect alternatives has a facilitative effect on oddity learning. The effect has been found in children (Gollin, Saravo, & Salt en, 1967;Gollin & Schadler, 1972), chimpanzees (Nissen & McCulloch, 1937), and canaries (Pastore, 1954). Unfortunately, studies that have manipulated number of incorrect alternatives have not provided the position data with which to evaluate the two odditylearning hypotheses.…”

Section: Methodsmentioning

confidence: 99%

Oddity learning in the pigeon: Effect of negative instances, correction, and number of incorrect alternatives

Zentall

Hogan

Edwards

1980

Animal Learning & Behavior

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Pigeons have difficulty learning a standard oddity task involving two colors and three stimulus positions. In Experiment 1, performance on standard noncorrection trials was compared with performance on (1) rerun correction trials in which errors resulted in trial repetition, (2) noncorrection trials with added "negative instance" trials involving presentation of three stimuli, all of which matched, and (3) a combination of correction and added negative instance trials. Results indicated that negative instances, but not correction trials, significantly facilitated oddity performance. In Experiment 2, Phase 1, number of stimulus positions lit (three or five) was factorially manipulated with number of positions on which the odd stimulus could appear (three or five). An increase in number of positions lit, but not number of positions that could be odd, facilitated performance. In Phase 2, birds transferred from trials with five positions lit to four positions lit performed significantly better than controls; but in Phase 3, the same birds did not perform significantly better than controls when transferred to trials with three positions lit. In both experiments, analysis of performance as a function of response position indicated better performance at the end of each display than in the middle. These results, together with the group performance differences in Experiment 2, suggest that oddity learning in pigeons involves a size, or number, discrimination.

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Section: Methodsmentioning

confidence: 99%

Oddity learning in the pigeon: Effect of negative instances, correction, and number of incorrect alternatives

Zentall

Hogan

Edwards

1980

Animal Learning & Behavior

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“…Oddity tasks can be adapted to each species, and can therefore be relatively free of confounding contextual variables (species differences in sensory and motor capacities, motivational variables, etc.). There have been numerous reports that rats (Wodinsky & Bitterman, 1953), cats (Warren, 1960), canaries (Pastore, 1954), and pigeons (Zentall & Hogan, 1974), to mention only a few examples, have used the oddity concept.…”

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Visual and olfactory oddity learning in rats: What evidence is necessary to show conceptual behavior?

Thomas

Noble

1988

Animal Learning & Behavior

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Experiment 1 involved the use of plastic and wooden objects and trial-unique problems. The rats performed successfully on nonconceptual oddity problems given before and after conceptual training, showing that the testing conditions were suitable, but they showed chance performances on the trial-unique problems. Experiment 2 involved the use of olfactory discriminanda. Five pretraining problems and 300 unique five-trial problems were presented. Two of 3 rats performed better than chance on Trial 2 and on Trials 3-5, but all performed at chance levels on Trial 1 throughout. The data suggest that the rats responded to specific odors on Trials 2-5 following the Trial 1 experience, as opposed to responding conceptuallyto the "odd" odor. Had they responded conceptually to odd odors, they should have performed better than chance on Triall. These findings and the general logical argument that they support are considered in the context ofthe numerous inconclusive reports of the use of the oddity concept by nonprimate animals.In the context of the evolution of intelligence, the oddity concept is an important example of relative class con-

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“…The oddity concept appears to have been the most investigated relative class concept using the most different species of animals, including birds (e.g., Lombardi, Fachinelli, & Delius, 1984;Pastore, 1954;Wright & Delius, 1994;Zentall & Hogan, 1974), rodents (e.g., Langworthy & Jennings, 1972;Nakagawa, 1993;Wodinsky & Bitterman, 1953), carnivores (e.g., Strong & Hedges, 1966;Warren, 1960), and primates (e.g., Bernstein, 1961;Levine & Harlow, 1959;Thomas & Frost, 1983). Despite many claims that nonprimate animals have been shown to be able to perform oddity problems successfully on a conceptual Reprint requests may be sent to Roger K. Thomas, Department of Psychology, The University of Georgia, Athens, basis, it has been suggested that the studies using nonprimate animals likely have all been subject to confounding variables or competing interpretations that render interpretations of successful oddity concept-based performance inconclusive (e.g., Premack, 1978;Steirn & Thomas, 1990;Thomas, 1994Thomas, , 1996.…”

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confidence: 99%

An Investigation of Oddity Concept Learning by Rats

Bailey

Thomas

1998

Psychol Rec

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Four male rats (Rattus norvegicus, Long-Evans) 114 days old at pretraining were tested using ping pong balls with foodflavoring odors as discriminanda. Two same-odor and one different-odor balls were presented on each trial, and 60 different problems were administered each to an 80% correct criterion or 100 trials. To assess conceptual use of oddity the first trial of each problem was used; Trials 2 and 3 were used to assess learning set performance. One rat had two significant runs of correct first trials, but he did not sustain it. All rats showed rapid improvement on Trials 2 and 3 affirming their excellent learning set formation. The need and means for continued investigation of oddity concept learning by rats are discussed.

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Discrimination learning in the canary.

Cited by 28 publications

References 5 publications

Oddity learning in the pigeon: Effect of negative instances, correction, and number of incorrect alternatives

Oddity learning in the pigeon: Effect of negative instances, correction, and number of incorrect alternatives

Visual and olfactory oddity learning in rats: What evidence is necessary to show conceptual behavior?

An Investigation of Oddity Concept Learning by Rats

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