Discrimination Learning Between and Within Complex Displays

Abstract

The present experiment was designed to investigate discrimination learning between and within complex displays in a concept formation task. The displays were characterized by the presence or absence of a distinctive feature (human form) which was constantly varied from trial to trial. Subjects (pigeons) were able to acquire a discrimination between feature-present and feature-absent displays when such displays were assigned to positive and negative trials. Such differential training also caused responding within displays to converge on that distinctive feature in preference to other features which were common to reinforced and nonreinforced trials. The discriminations developed by the training procedure remained throughout extinction tests with "new" displays. In general, the development of stimulus control between and within these displays paralleled such development in simple displays as reported by Jenkins and Sainsbury (1969).