Pavlovian Conditioning and the Random Control Procedure

Abstract

<p> This thesis is concerned with control procedures employed in Pavlovian conditioning, in particular, the "truly random" control. Pilot work indicated that this procedure employed in a CER paradigm resulted in response suppression. Our first objective then was to examine this finding in a more formal experiment, as well as attempting to determine the cause of the observed suppression. In a second experiment, a variable predicted to affect the amount of conditioning within traditional conditioning theory was employed to determine the possible role of this variable in suppression produced by the random control procedure.</p> <p> It was found, in the first experiment, that two variations of the random procedure resulted in suppression in testing. The results of a third group indicated that the suppression was not due to a between-session discriminative function of the CS. A fourth group demonstrated, within contingency logic, inhibitory control, but this group, like the others, showed suppression.</p> <p> In the second experiment, variations of stimulus conditions, none of which made the US contingent on the CS, resulted in marked differences in suppression in testing. Further, significantly different recovery rates of the operant baseline were noted both as a function of the recovery condition and of the CS employed in training.</p>