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Journal of the Experimental Analysis of Behavior logoLink to Journal of the Experimental Analysis of Behavior
. 1968 May;11(3):223–238. doi: 10.1901/jeab.1968.11-223

The discrimination of stimulus duration by pigeons1

Alan Stubbs
PMCID: PMC1338480  PMID: 5660703

Abstract

Pigeons were trained to discriminate the duration of a stimulus. One response in a psychophysical choice situation was reinforced, given the immediately prior presentation of a stimulus duration in one class of durations called short durations, and the other response was reinforced given the immediately prior presentation of a stimulus duration in a second class called long durations. Durations of equal logarithmic difference from the cutoff, whether in the short or long class, yielded equal accuracy. Accuracy was a function not only of the properties of the stimuli to be discriminated, but also of the experimental contingencies used. Accuracy was greater in variable-ratio than in fixed-ratio schedules of reinforcement of the discriminative responses, and was lower at the beginning than later in individual fixed ratios. Proportion of short or long responses (response bias) was affected by sequential dependencies among long and short durations and was effectively controlled through the use of asymmetric reinforcement and fixed-ratio contingencies.

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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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