The Problem is not Learning: Facilitated Acquisition of Stimulus Equivalence Classes Among Low-Achieving college students

Abstract

The present study examines whether facilitated acquisition occurs in contexts when 1 stimulus in a class is emotionally evocative and the other stimuli are arbitrary or neutral. Undergraduates with high and low grade-point averages (GPA) completed a matching-to-sample task that resulted in the formation of 3 stimulus equivalence classes. Each class contained 2 arbitrary stimuli and 1 nonarbitrary stimulus. The nonarbitrary stimulus was either emotionally evocative (academic failure words) or emotionally neutral. Results indicated facilitated acquisition of the academic failure class among low-GPA college students. Findings suggest that stimuli that were once neutral may become associated with emo