Resistance to Extinction and Relapse in Combined Stimulus Contexts (original) (raw)
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Training reinforcement rates, resistance to extinction, and the role of context in reinstatement
Learning & Behavior, 2015
Behavior reduced as a consequence of extinction or intervention can relapse. According to behavioral momentum theory, the extent to which behavior persists and relapses once it has been eliminated depends on the relative training reinforcement rate among discriminative stimuli. In addition, studies of context renewal reveal that relapse depends on the similarity between the training stimulus context and the test stimulus context following disruption by extinction. In the present experiments with pigeons, we arranged different reinforcement rates in the presence of distinct discriminative stimuli across components of a multiple schedule. Following extinction, we attempted to reinstate responding in the presence of those target components with response-independent food presentations. Importantly, we arranged the reinstating food presentations either within the target components or in separate components, either paired with extinction (Experiment 1) or reinforcement (Experiment 2) during baseline. Reinstatement increased with greater training reinforcement rates when the reinstating food presentations were arranged in the target components and the separate components paired with reinforcement during training. Reinstatement was smaller and was not systematically related to training reinforcement rates in the target components when reinstating food presentation occurred in separate components paired with extinction. These findings suggest that relapse depends on the history of reinforcement associated with the discriminative stimuli in which the relapse-inducing event occurs.
Journal of the Experimental Analysis of Behavior, 2010
Basic research with pigeons on behavioral momentum suggests that differential reinforcement of alternative behavior (DRA) can increase the resistance of target behavior to change. This finding suggests that clinical applications of DRA may inadvertently increase the persistence of target behavior even as it decreases its frequency. We conducted three coordinated experiments to test whether DRA has persistence-strengthening effects on clinically significant target behavior and then tested the effectiveness of a possible solution to this problem in both a nonhuman and clinical study. Experiment 1 compared resistance to extinction following baseline rates of reinforcement versus higher DRA rates of reinforcement in a clinical study. Resistance to extinction was substantially greater following DRA. Experiment 2 tested a rat model of a possible solution to this problem. Training an alternative response in a context without reinforcement of the target response circumvented the persistence-strengthening effects of DRA. Experiment 3 translated the rat model into a novel clinical application of DRA. Training an alternative response with DRA in a separate context resulted in lower resistance to extinction than employing DRA in the context correlated with reinforcement of target behavior. The value of coordinated bidirectional translational research is discussed.
Response decrements produced by extinction and by response-independent reinforcement1
Journal of the Experimental Analysis of Behavior, 1973
The effects of extinction and of response-independent (free) reinforcement in decreasing rates of key pecking by pigeons were compared in single schedule (Phase 1) and multiple (Phase 2) conditions. In both phases, response rates decreased more rapidly vith extinction than with free reinforcement conditions. Behavioral contrast was obtained from subjects trained in a multiple schedule involving extinction in Phase 2, whereas subjects trained in a multiple schedule involving free reinforcement showed a slight negative induction effect. WVhether subjects experienced extinction or free reinforcenment under single stimulus conditions did not affect subsequent performance in the discrimination situation of the second phase. Disinhibition testing was carried out at the end of both phases, but there was no evidence for disinhibitory effects under any condition.
Resistance to extinction, generalization decrement, and conditioned reinforcement
Behavioural Processes, 2008
This study investigated generalization decrement during an extinction resistance-to-change test for pigeon key pecking using a two-component multiple schedule with equal variable-interval 3-min schedules and different reinforcer amounts (one component presented 2-s access to reinforcement and the other 8 s). After establishing baseline responding, subjects were assigned to one of the two extinction conditions: hopper stimuli (hopper and hopper light were activated but no food was available) or Control (inactive hopper and hopper light). Responding in the 8-s component was more resistant to extinction than responding in the 2-s component, the hopper stimuli group was more resistant to extinction compared to the Control group, and an interaction between amount of reinforcement, extinction condition, and session block was present. This finding supports generalization decrement as a factor that influences resistance to extinction. Hopper-time data (the amount of time subjects spent with their heads in the hopper) were compared to resistance-to-change data in an investigation of the role of conditioned reinforcement on resistance to change.
A reminder of extinction reduces relapse in an animal model of voluntary behavior
Learning & Memory, 2017
One experiment with rats explored whether an extinction-cue prevents the recovery of extinguished lever-pressing responses. Initially, rats were trained to perform one instrumental response (R1) for food in Context A, and a different instrumental response (R2) in Context B. Then, responses were extinguished each in the alternate context (R1 in Context B; R2 in Context A). For one group, extinction of both responses was conducted in the presence of an extinction-cue, whereas in a second group, the extinction-cue only accompanied extinction of R1. During a final test, we observed that returning the rats to the initial acquisition context renewed performance and that response recovery was attenuated in the presence of the cue that accompanied extinction of the response. The impact of the extinction-cue, however, was not transferred to the response that has been extinguished without the cue. Our results are consistent with the idea that extinction established an inhibitory cueresponse association.
Effects of baseline reinforcement rate on operant ABA and ABC renewal
2014
Renewal is a relapse phenomenon that occurs when the contextual stimuli present during extinction change, and consequently, an extinguished response increases in rate. Two experiments assessed extinction and renewal of key-pecking in pigeons in a two-component multiple schedule wherein baseline reinforcer rates were delivered at relatively rich or lean rates. In Experiment 1, an ABA design was used in which baseline stimuli were steady key lights (Context A). Food was then removed during extinction, and simultaneously, the context was changed by flashing the key lights (Context B). Following extinction, steady key lights were reintroduced, but food remained unavailable. Key-pecking was more resistant to extinction and recovered to a greater degree in the rich relative to the lean component. In Experiment 2, we introduced novel stimuli following extinction (ABC renewal) rather than reintroducing baseline stimuli. Similar to Experiment 1, in Experiment 2 resistance to change and renewal remained greater in the component associated with higher reinforcer rates during baseline. These findings provide additional support for the context-specificity of operant extinction, and support the prediction of behavioral momentum theory that stimuli associated with higher rates of reinforcement engender greater persistence and relapse than those associated with lower rates of reinforcement.
Resurgence after different number of target-extinction or alternative-reinforcement sessions in rats
Learning and Motivation, 2020
Resurgence after different number of sessions (4, 12, or 36) was studied in two experiments using a four-phase procedure-that is, target-response extinction and alternative-response reinforcement occurred in separate phases of the procedure (cf. three-phase procedure). For the first experiment, three groups of rats were exposed to different number of target-extinction sessions while the number of target-and alternative-reinforcement sessions was held constant; whereas, for the second experiment, target-reinforcement and-extinction sessions remained the same between phases, while alternative-reinforcement sessions varied between groups. No differences in resurgence were observed as a result of different numbers of target-extinction sessions. However, when different numbers of alternative-reinforcement sessions were arranged, greater resurgence was observed after 36 sessions. As previously reported, the current findings suggest resurgence could be mitigated or promoted by subject's extinction or alternative-reinforcement history.
Greater reinforcement rate during training increases spontaneous recovery
Journal of the experimental analysis of behavior, 2018
Spontaneous recovery occurs when a previously reinforced and recently extinguished response reemerges over the course of time, often at the beginning of a new session of extinction. Spontaneous recovery could underlie instances of treatment relapse that threaten otherwise effective behavioral interventions for problem behavior. In two experiments, we arranged multiple schedules with pigeons and a human child to assess the effects of different training reinforcer rates on spontaneous recovery. In both experiments, responding was both more resistant to extinction and more likely to relapse following training with greater reinforcement rates upon returning to extinction after time off from extinction testing. A quantitative model based on behavioral momentum theory accounted well for the data, which suggests reexposure to the extinction context following time off during extinction resulted in (1) the failure of extinction learning to generalize, and (2) greater generalization of origin...
The dynamics of conditioning and extinction.
Pigeons responded to intermittently reinforced classical conditioning trials with erratic bouts of responding to the conditioned stimulus. Responding depended on whether the prior trial contained a peck, food, or both. A linear persistence-learning model moved pigeons into and out of a response state, and a Weibull distribution for number of within-trial responses governed in-state pecking. Variations of trial and intertrial durations caused correlated changes in rate and probability of responding and in model parameters. A novel prediction-in the protracted absence of food, response rates can plateau above zero-was validated. The model predicted smooth acquisition functions when instantiated with the probability of food but a more accurate jagged learning curve when instantiated with trial-to-trial records of reinforcement. The Skinnerian parameter was dominant only when food could be accelerated or delayed by pecking. These experiments provide a framework for trial-by-trial accounts of conditioning and extinction that increases the information available from the data, permitting such accounts to comment more definitively on complex contemporary models of momentum and conditioning.