The goal of this project is to understand how non-human animals come to treat physically different stimuli as behavioral equivalents in ways that cannot be explained by perceptual similarity. Using standard, two-choice conditional discriminations common to studies of other basic learning and memory processes, the project will assess the effectiveness of different training experiences in producing acquired stimulus equivalences and why some experiences are more effective than others despite considerable overlap. In the proposed studies, different discriminative stimuli will initially share a common relationship to another stimulus and/or response. Afterwards, equivalences between the different but commonly associated discriminative stimuli will be evaluated by directly training new responses to some of them and then observing whether or not the remaining stimuli also control the new responses. In short, will the new behavioral function generalize from the directly trained to the untrained (test) stimuli, as expected if the sets are equivalent? A major focus of this research is to assess whether or not conditioning of a common, mediating representation to the discriminative stimuli during training is the source of such generalization and what that mediating representation might be. The results will be important for understanding how novel behavior, one notable human characteristic, can also emerge in other animals despite the absence of direct (reinforced) training and any known language ability.
| Urcuioli, Peter J; Lionello-DeNolf, Karen M (2005) The role of common reinforced comparison responses in acquired sample equivalence. Behav Processes 69:207-22 |
| Lionello-DeNolf, Karen M; Urcuioli, Peter J (2003) A procedure for generating differential ""sample"" responding without different exteroceptive stimuli. J Exp Anal Behav 79:21-35 |
| Urcuioli, Peter J; Pierce, Jada N; Lionello-DeNolf, Karen M et al. (2002) The development of emergent differential sample behavior in pigeons. J Exp Anal Behav 78:409-32 |
| Lionello-DeNolf, Karen M; Urcuioli, Peter J (2002) Stimulus control topographies and tests of symmetry in pigeons. J Exp Anal Behav 78:467-95 |
| Lionello-DeNolf, K M; Urcuioli, P J (2000) Transfer of pigeons' matching to sample to novel sample locations. J Exp Anal Behav 73:141-61 |
| Urcuioli, P J; DeMarse, T B; Lionello, K M (1999) Sample-duration effects on pigeons' delayed matching as a function of predictability of duration. J Exp Anal Behav 72:279-97 |
| Lionello, K M; Urcuioli, P J (1998) Control by sample location in pigeons' matching to sample. J Exp Anal Behav 70:235-51 |
