A FURTHER LOOK AT REINFORCEMENT RATE AND RESURGENCE

Abstract

Resurgence is the recurrence of a previously reinforced and then extinguished response when a more recently reinforced response is extinguished. The purpose of the present experiments was to examine the relation between alternative reinforcement rates and resurgence with pigeons. Each experiment consisted of a three-phase procedure and each phase of three experiments was a two-component multiple schedule, except for Experiments 2a and 2b, which employed single schedules. In each experiment, the target response was reinforced according to a variable–interval (VI) schedule in the Acquisition phase. In the Elimination phase, the target response was eliminated using either extinction or a differential–reinforcement–of–other–behavior (DRO) schedule and the alternative response was reinforced according to a VI schedule. The rate of alternative reinforcement differed between components, but the number of reinforcers per hour (and thus the reinforcement ratio) was 60 and 180 in the Lean and Rich components, respectively. In the Resurgence phase, all reinforcers were withheld and resurgence was compared between components. Across all experiments, results were inconsistent. In some instances there was greater resurgence in the Rich component, but the opposite was observed in others. These results do not offer evidence supporting the prediction of behavioral momentum and related models of resurgence.