In this article, I discuss the concepts of "private stimuli," "covert responses," and "private events," emphasizing three aspects: the conditions under which private stimuli may acquire discriminative functions to verbal responses, the conditions of unobservability of covert responses, and the complexity of events or phenomena described as…

Second and sixth grade children solved a series of four-and eight-dimensional discrimination learning problems dictating selection of hypotheses which could be monitored by means of blank trials. Differential effects of stimulus complexity upon the performance of the two age groups are discussed. (GO)

Experiment 1 examined the relationship between dimensional preference and proportion of optional reversal shifts among adults. Experiment 2 examined dimensional preference and shift behaviors using an intradimensional-extradimensional shift paradigm. The results indicate that adults show the same type of behavior previously throught to…

Two experiments examined conditions under which complex discriminative behaviors could be established and maintained by reinforcement given concurrently for performance at related tasks. Results indicated that durable stimulus control of oddity responding could be obtained for two cue dimensions for which oddity responding was never reinforced.…

One of the most robust and reliable learning phenomena documented in the animal learning literature is the enhancement of discriminative performance by differential outcomes. To date, very few studies have focused on this effect in humans. The results obtained in these studies support the potential use of the differential outcomes procedure in…

Recognition memory, defined by novelty preferences, was found to vary over 4 discrimination tasks as a function of length of familiarization for 5-6-month-old infants. (ST)

Elementary school students were tested on a visual search task where letter matching was based on the visual or name characteristics of letters. Visual match lists were searched faster than name match lists by all three grades. (SBT)

This study is an initial investigation of the effects of a fading procedure upon acquisition and transfer of discrimination learning with children younger than 36 months of age. (CS)

Investigated the possibility that evidence of frequency discrimination might be found when the experimental procedures involved the conjugate reinforcement of nonnutritive sucking. (SDH)

Eight autistic children and young adolescents (mean age 12.9 years) were compared to normal chronological age controls. Ss were required to discriminate briefly presented visual stimuli when they were preceded or followed by a visual noise mask and when they were not. The minimum stimulus exposure duration for criterion identification of unmasked…

DISCRIMINATION IN THE SCHOOLS CAN ASSUME MANY FORMS. ONE KIND OF PREJUDICE INVOLVING THE ATTITUDES HELD TOWARD LOWER SOCIOECONOMIC CLASSES MAY BE TERMED "SITUATIONAL BIAS." IT IS DEFINED AS AN EVENT WHEREIN A PERSON, PERSONS, OR AN AGENCY DOES NOT HAVE FACILITIES AVAILABLE TO COUNTERACT THE ABSENCE OR PRESENCE OF A QUALITY OR ATTRIBUTE…

The role of memory factors in the vowel discrimination of normal and at-risk 8-week-old infants was examined by studying the categorical versus continuous discrimination of very brief vowels in a nonnutritive sucking paradigm. Discrimination of the silent delay interval between the last familiar and the first novel stimulus was also examined.…

Seven rhesus monkeys reared on diets high in phenylalanine to induce phenylketonuria (PKU--a metabolic disorder associated with mental retardation if untreated) were compared with normal, pair-fed, and younger controls; frontal brain-lesioned monkeys; and those raised on high-tryptophan diets in three object discrimination tasks. (Author)