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Journal of the Experimental Analysis of Behavior logoLink to Journal of the Experimental Analysis of Behavior
. 1965 Mar;8(2):107–116. doi: 10.1901/jeab.1965.8-107

Overt “mediating” behavior during temporally spaced responding1

Victor G Laties, Bernard Weiss, Richard L Clark, Michael D Reynolds
PMCID: PMC1338372  PMID: 14269563

Abstract

A rat was trained on a schedule that programmed reinforcements only when a minimum waiting time between successive responses was exceeded (DRL schedule). It was observed to fill much of the pause between lever presses with a stereotyped behavioral chain: it would take its tail in its mouth and nibble it. This behavior was shown to be functionally related to the efficiency with which the subject spaced its responses. It is thought to have served as mediating behavior, providing discriminating stimuli for appropriate lever presses.

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Selected References

These references are in PubMed. This may not be the complete list of references from this article.

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