The objective of this research is to integrate the study of learned performance with the study of the levels of organization underlying behavior. Complex levels of organization are apparent in the recurrent patterns, time course, and amount of behavior expressed within a particular time frame, for example, the circadian rhythm, meal frequency, and amount consumed in the rat's daily feeding pattern. Traditional approaches to the study of learning have focused on the details of stimulus and response associations while ignoring or placing arbitrary constraints on the levels of behavioral organization. For example, experimenters constrain daily intake of food noncontingently, while imposing contingency schedules which constrain the organization of feeding at levels ranging from the consumption of individual pellets through the size of a meal. The present experiments focus on the relation between learned performance and the levels of temporal organization of 14 behaviors related to feeding, drinking, general activity, sexual interest, and shelter-seeking. The initial studies examined the levels of temporal organization of these behaviors in continuous 24 hour session under a 12/12 hour light-dark cycle. Following establishment of the tentative levels of organization, each level of one behavior from each category was subjected to both noncontingent and contingent (instrumental) constaints on its duration and on its inter-event-interval. The remaining studies examined the time course of tendencies to compensate for constraints on behavior, and the intervals over which animals anticipate and integrate information about changes in response access. The results (1) provide a detailed description of the levels of behavioral organization in a number of biologically important systems of behavior; (2) determine the nature of and the relation among levels of behavioral control; (3) determine parallels between learned and unlearned adaptation to constraint at different levels of different behaviors; and, (4) specify the role of timing in anticipation of and compensation for changes in response access.
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