The comparative psychology of fixed-interval responding: Some quantitative analyses

Lejeune, Helga; Wearden, J. H.

doi:10.1016/0023-9690(91)90018-4

Cited by 117 publications

(114 citation statements)

References 26 publications

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“…When data from a number of intervals of FI are aggregated together, average response rate increases as a function of elapsed time in the interval in almost all animal species tested (Lejeune & Wearden, 1991), including mice, fish, and turtles, as well as the more conventional rats and pigeons.…”

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confidence: 99%

“…This response rate increase usually takes the form of the left half of a Gaussian curve with the peak located at the FI value (Lejeune & Wearden, 1991).…”

mentioning

confidence: 99%

“…One example of the application of ideas derived from SET to simple FI schedules comes from Lejeune and Wearden (1991). As mentioned above, they analyzed data from different species on FI schedules, and fitted Gaussian curves to the function relating response rate to elapsed time in the interval.…”

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confidence: 99%

“…The spread of the curve, that is, whether response rate grew gradually throughout the interval or was concentrated at the end of it, could be measured by the standard deviation of the fitted Gaussian curve, and the standard deviation can be divided by the mean (effectively the peak location) of the curve to yield a coefficient of variation statistic. SET requires that coefficients of variation remain constant as the interval timed varies (this is a form of the scalar property of variance which gives the theory its name), and Lejeune and Wearden (1991) found that there was a large duration range over which this was true for most animal species studied. In addition, the coefficient of variation, effectively a measure of temporal sensitivity where lower values indicate higher sensitivity, varied systematically with species, being lowest in cats, rats, and mice, higher in birds, and highest of all in fish and turtles.The more complex peak interval procedure has also been used frequently to test SET, see Church et al (1994) for only one example among many.…”

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confidence: 99%

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Multiple-interval timing in rats: Performance on two-valued mixed fixed-interval schedules.

Whitaker

Lowe²,

Wearden³

2003

Journal of Experimental Psychology: Animal Behavior Processes

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Three experiments studied timing in rats on 2-valued mixed-fixed-interval schedules, with equally probable components, Fixed-Interval S and Fixed-Interval L (FI S and FI L, respectively). When the L:S ratio was greater than 4, 2 distinct response peaks appeared close to FI S and FI L, and data could be well fitted by the sum of 2 Gaussian curves. When the L:S ratio was less than 4, only 1 response peak was usually visible, but nonlinear regression often identified separate sources of behavioral control, by FI S and FI L, although control by FI L dominated. Data were used to test ideas derived from scalar expectancy theory, the behavioral theory of timing, and learning to time.

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mentioning

confidence: 99%

“…This response rate increase usually takes the form of the left half of a Gaussian curve with the peak located at the FI value (Lejeune & Wearden, 1991).…”

mentioning

confidence: 99%

mentioning

confidence: 99%

mentioning

confidence: 99%

See 2 more Smart Citations

Multiple-interval timing in rats: Performance on two-valued mixed fixed-interval schedules.

Whitaker

Lowe²,

Wearden³

2003

Journal of Experimental Psychology: Animal Behavior Processes

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“…Arranging a regular distribution of reinforcers in time, as in a fixed-interval (FI) schedule of reinforcement, is a procedure that has been used extensively to study the timing abilities of organisms (Lejeune & Wearden, 1991). It has long been recognized that unexpected nonreinforced (N) cycles are followed by higher response rates than reinforced (R) cycles are (Staddon & Innis, 1966).…”

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Role of nonreinforcement in the fixed-interval performance of pigeons

Papini

Hollingsworth

1998

Psychon Bull Rev

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Fixed-interval (F1) schedules have been used extensively to study timing abilities. In F1 schedules, animals typically show higher response rates immediately after nonreinforced (N) cycles rather than reinforced (R) cycles (the reinforcement-omission effect), and they exhibit the highest rate approximately at the time when the reinforcer is scheduled to occur (peak performance). The present experiments were designed to determine the extent to which factors other than timing contribute significantly to these two learning phenomena. Pigeons were trained in an F116-sec schedule in which half the cycles were R and half were N. When successive cycles were separated by a 2-sec interval, responding early in the F1 interval was higher after an N cycle than after an R cycle. This reinforcementomission effect was eliminated when the interval between cycles was increased to 12 sec, because of an increase in performance after R cycles. In addition, timing of the 16-sec interval was assessed by interpolating 32-sec test cycles (all N cycles) at two rate5-€ither 1 test cycle every other session, or 25 test cycles per session. Peak performance, presumably indexing the animal's ability to time the 16-sec interval, emerged only with 25 test cycles per day, but not with 1 test cycle every other day, despite extensive training with the target, 16-sec-Iong interval. These results suggest that transient demotivation and time-based discrimination contribute significantly to the reinforcement-omission effect and peak performance, respectively. 84Arranging a regular distribution of reinforcers in time, as in a fixed-interval (FI) schedule of reinforcement, is a procedure that has been used extensively to study the timing abilities of organisms (Lejeune & Wearden, 1991). It has long been recognized that unexpected nonreinforced (N) cycles are followed by higher response rates than reinforced (R) cycles are (Staddon & Innis, 1966). This phenomenon, referred to as the reinforcementomission effect, has been linked to a variety of mechanisms, including the role of reinforcement in resetting the internal clock used to estimate the duration of the interval (Mellon, Leak, Fairhurst, & Gibbon, 1995). However, as Mellon et al. noted, when the reinforcement and other associated cues are omitted, animals face what is essentially a longer FI cycle. This situation approaches the conditions of the peak procedure, in which an unusually long test cycle is interpolated with shorter training cycles to assess the animal's ability to estimate the duration of the short interval. Animals exhibit peak performance-that is, a maximum response rate in the long test cycle at approximately the time within the interval when reinforcement is usually scheduled to occur (S. Roberts, 1981). In the present experiments, we examined the contribution of factors other than timing to these learning phenomena.The research reported in this paper was partially supported by TCU/RF Grant 5-23832 to M.R.P. Requests for reprints may be sent to M. R. Papini, Department of Psychology...

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Interval‐timing Protocols and Their Relevancy to the Study of Temporal Cognition and Neurobehavioral Genetics

Yin

Lusk

Meck

2017

Handbook of Neurobehavioral Genetics and Phenotyping

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The comparative psychology of fixed-interval responding: Some quantitative analyses

Cited by 117 publications

References 26 publications

Multiple-interval timing in rats: Performance on two-valued mixed fixed-interval schedules.

Multiple-interval timing in rats: Performance on two-valued mixed fixed-interval schedules.

Role of nonreinforcement in the fixed-interval performance of pigeons

Interval‐timing Protocols and Their Relevancy to the Study of Temporal Cognition and Neurobehavioral Genetics

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