Joint Control and the Selection of Stimuli from Their Description

Abstract

This research examined the role the two constituents of joint control, the tact and the echoic, play in producing accurate selections of novel stimuli in response to their spoken descriptions. Experiment 1 examined the role of tacts. In response to unfamiliar spoken descriptions, children learned to select from among six successively presented comparisons which varied in their color, shape, and border features. Repeated testing and training revealed that accurate selecting with new combinations of the same colors, shapes and borders, did not occur until after the children could themselves tact the individual color, shape and border features with the unfamiliar descriptions. Experiment 2 examined the role of self-echoics. Here, the stimulus features were given their familiar names, but the rehearsal of these names, while searching among the six successively presented comparisons, was impeded by a distracter task. Under these conditions selection of the correct comparison was found to depend on its position in the order of presentation. Correct comparisons presented earlier in the order, and presumably less effected by the distracter task, were more likely to be selected than correct comparisons presented later in the serial order. Taken together, these data suggest that generalized stimulus selection must be under joint tact/echoic control. The data also illustrate the distinction between mediated selection of a stimulus in response to its description (i.e., selection under joint control) and the traditional conception of an unmediated selection response evoked as a result of a heightened response probability in a conditional discrimination.

Covert verbal mediation in arbitrary matching to sample

“…The results from the high‐verbal group are consistent with previous research demonstrating that the response products of mediating behavior can provide supplemental sources of stimulus control in MTS performance for rats (e.g., Laties et al, ), pigeons (e.g., Sidman, ), monkeys (e.g., Hodos et al, ), children (Parsons et al, ), and college students (e.g., Santos, Ma, & Miguel, ). In addition, the current study replicates and extends previous research on joint control that showed disrupting mediating verbal behavior impairs performance (e.g., Clough et al, ; DeGraaf & Schlinger, ; Gutierrez, ; Lowenkron, ; Sidener & Michael, ).…”

“…By contrast, Horne and Lowe () and Lowenkron (), who base their positions on Skinner's () analysis of verbal behavior, argue that overt and covert verbal and nonverbal mediating behaviors play an important role in the development of equivalence classes, relational frames, and emergent relations. In support of their view, several studies have demonstrated a participant's self‐verbal behavior can affect performance on various complex tasks (e.g., DeGraff & Schlinger, ; Greer & Longano, ; Horne, Lowe, & Randle, ; Lowenkron, , ; Miguel, Petursdottir, Carr, & Michael, ; Randell & Remington, ; Sidener & Michael, ; Wulfert, Dougher, & Greenway, ).…”

“…Lowenkron () extended the analysis of joint control to covert verbal mediation with two experiments in which at least one of the variables involved a private event. The first experiment attempted to establish generalized matching behavior without the tact component.…”

Training intraverbal bidirectional naming to establish generalized equivalence class performances

“…Another possible manipulation to assess the role of verbal mediation is utilizing a blocking procedure (e.g., Arntzen, 2006;Clough, Meyer, & Miguel, 2016;Gutierrez, 2006;Lowenkron, 2006). Researchers have found that specific overt responses (e.g., singing, counting backwards, solving simple multiplication problems) emitted during MTS tests may cause performance to deteriorate.…”

Language evolution to revolution: the leap from rich-vocabulary non-recursive communication system to recursive language 70,000 years ago was associated with acquisition of a novel component of imagination, called Prefrontal Synthesis, enabled by a mutation that slowed down the prefrontal cortex maturation simultaneously in two or more children – the Romulus and Remus hypothesis

“…In ABA jargon, these techniques are known as "visual-visual and auditory-visual conditional discrimination" [40][41][42][43] , "development of multi-cue responsivity" 36 , and "reduction of stimulus overselectivity" 37 .…”