Variables controlling the overlearning reversal effect (ORE).

Abstract

128 hooded rats were trained in a black-white discrimination task in a Y maze according to a 2X2X2X2 factorial design. Large or small reward, correction or noncorrection procedure, distinctive or nondistinctive trials were combined in the 8 possible combinations during acquisition. For 1 the Ss in each group reversal learning began upon reaching criterion, for the other i 200 additional trials were given before reversal. Overlearning facilitated reversal learning when reward was large, but not when reward was small, and the ORE was more likely to occur under correction than under noncorrection procedures. Distinctiveness as manipulated in this experiment, did not have a large differential effect on the ORE. Overlearned Ss in both conditions performed better during reversal than did mastery Ss. The results for reward and training procedure were discussed with reference to frustration theory.

Overtraining, extinction, and reversal in the rat.

“…The results of this study are in agreement with previous experiments (Hooper, 1967;Mackintosh, 1969, Experiment 3;Theios & Blosser, 1965a, 1965b in showing that overtraining with large reward facilitates reversal learning. However, the present study has demonstrated that the ORE is reduced to a nonsignificant level if an extinction period is interpolated between acquisition and reversal.…”

Successive discrimination reversal performance as a function of level of drive and incentive

“…In general, the results also support findings of studies using rats as Ss wherein discrimination and single reversal acquisition are an increasing function of increases in magnitude of reward (Hill, Cotton, & Clayton, 1962;Hooper, 1967).…”

“…In studies involving the establishment of a discriminative habit in rats and then a single reversal of the reinforcement contingencies, the general finding has been that large magnitudes of reward facilitate discrimination and reversal acquisition (Hill, Cotton, & Clayton, 1962;Hooper, 1967). In investigations manipulating drive level alone, results have been variable; high drive sometimes facilitates and sometimes retards discrimination and/or reversal acquisition (Arnms, 1958;Buchwald & Yamaguchi, 1955;Eisman, Asinow, & Maltzman, 1956;Kendler & Lachman, 1958;Wike, Blocher, & Knowles, 1963).…”

Training Procedures and Task Difficulty in Brightness and Position Discriminations by Rats

“…For example, the two most common discrimination problems for rats in single-unit mazes are those of position and brightness. Yet, Hooper (1967) found no difference between training procedures in the initial acquisition of a black-white discrimination using a Y-maze while McKelvey (1956) found noncorrection to be superior to correction in the acquisition of a similar discrimination using a Grice apparatus. Fowler, et al (1967) found an interaction between training procedure and task difficulry in a T-maze using a light discrimination.…”

“…Differences in training procedures have been shown to account for behavioral differences in the rheoretically significant studies of shock for correct responses (Fowler, Spelt, & Wischner, 1967), drive-stimulus discrimination (Besch, Morris, & Levine, 1963), and the overlearning reversal effect (Hooper, 1967). Differences in training procedures have been suspected of accounting for differences in behavior in studies of continuous and noncontinuous discrimination learning (Spence, 1940), place versus response learning (Restle, 1957), proactive inhibition in infrahuman animals (Kehoe, 1963), probability matching (Estes, 1962), and differential discriminability of cues (Babb, 1968).…”