Alcohol as a cue for extinction: State dependency produced by conditioned inhibition

A conditioned-emotional-response (CER) paradigm was used in two experiments to evaluate the effects of alcohol on extinction. In both experiments, rats received tone-shock pairings without alcohol and then received extinction trials either with or without alcohol (injections of saline, .75 or 1.5 g/kg ethanol). The high dose of alcohol suppressed baseline barpressing for food reward, but there was only weak evidence (Experiment 2) that it enhanced responding during the tone early in extinction. In both experiments, extinction of CER under the high alcohol dose was found to be state dependent, that is, post-extinction tests after saline injection showed a reinstatement of suppression to the tone. Experiment 2 indicated that this effect could be attributed to alcohol’s becoming a conditioned inhibitory stimulus as a result of its association with extinction. This supports the general suggestion that situational stimuli normally become inhibitory during the course of simple extinction and may have implications for the role that state-dependent learning plays in drug dependence.     

Preservation of response-outcome associations through extinction

In four experiments, rats learned initial response-outcome (R-O) associations in an instrumental training task. They then were given training of those same responses either with another outcome (Experiments 1 and 2) or with nonreward (Experiments 3 and 4). The presence of the original R-O associations was detected by measuring the depressive effect on responding of devaluing that O by pairing with LiCl. The results indicated that the original R-O associations remained intact through both potentially interfering treatments.     

Enhancement of conditioned inhibition via an extinction treatment

Rats were used in a conditioned-suppression paradigm to determine whether an extinction treatment would enhance a moderately developed conditioned inhibitor (CS?). To dissipate unconditioned suppression to the training stimuli, the subjects were first habituated to the stimuli and then given Pavlovian conditioned-inhibition (CI) training involving reinforced presentations of a clicker and nonreinforced compound presentations of that stimulus and the intended CS?, either a light or a tone. Thereafter, experimental subjects received presentations of their CS? by itself, whereas controls received no further training. Following the occurrence and loss of conditioned suppression to the CS? in the extinction phase, summation and retardation tests showed enhanced CI for the experimental subjects relative to both the controls and their own earlier levels of inhibitory performance. In fact, the enhanced inhibition for the experimental subjects approximated that shown by a comparison group for which the CS? had been strongly developed as an inhibitor. These findings suggest that an excitatory representation is associated with the CS? early in CI training, and that subsequent presentations of the CS? by itself strengthen its inhibitory effect by allowing it to be nonreinforced in the presence of that representation.     

The role of spatial and temporal contiguity in defensive burying in rats

The degree of spatial and temporal contiguity between contact with a prod and shock was varied in three experiments to see how these factors contribute to defensive burying. In Experiment 1, rats shocked once through a grid floor while touching a prod buried the prod just as much as did rats shocked through the prod. Experiment 2 showed that rats either shocked through the floor more than 1 min after touching the prod or shocked in the absence of a prod did not bury the prod. Thus, close temporal contiguity between grid shock and prod contact appears necessary for burying. Nevertheless, grid-shocked rats do learn something different from prod-shocked rats, since they bury the prod less and the walls more than do prod-shocked rats when the position of the prod is changed in the test chamber (Experiment 3).     

The role of instructional variables in conceptual change in high school physics topics

This study was conducted to determine the effect of three variables on conceptual change in physics. Ninth and 10th-grade students who, despite instruction, still held nonscientific intuitive ideas about the motion of objects participated in viewing a demonstration, engaged in student-to-student discussion, and/or read a refutational text about Newton's laws of motion. Students (N = 310) were randomly assigned within classes to eight groups representing combinations of the three activities and participated in pretesting, instruction, and posttesting. Posttest results revealed that reading the refutational text helped students change their intuitive ideas to scientific ones, while seeing a demonstration affected how students interacted with group and text on some measures. Discussing ideas in a group did not lead to significant learning of scientific notions but, rather, caused students to be less influenced by either the demonstration or the text.     

Success in everyday physics: The role of personality and academic variables*

Two studies examined students' intuitive physics ability and characteristics associated with physics competence. In Study 1, although many students did well on a physics quiz, more than 25% of students performed below levels predicted by chance. Better performance on the physics quiz was related to physics grades, highest level of math taken, and students' perceived scholastic competence, but was not related to a number of other hypothesized personality variables. Study 2 further explored personality and academic variables and also examined students' awareness of their own physics ability. Results indicate that the personality variables were again unrelated to ability, but narcissism may be related to subjects' estimates of knowledge. Also, academic variables and how important students think it is to understand the physical world are related to both measured and estimated physics proficiency. © 2002 Wiley Periodicals, Inc. J Res Sci Teach 39: 394–409, 2002     

Learning through crisis: The educator's role

Opportunities for learning offered by natural disasters and human‐caused tragedies can bring something useful to events steeped in pain, grief, and confusion.     

Learning through transitions: The role of institutions

In this paper two models are proposed for analysing transitions in education. Firstly, transitions are the processes that follow ruptures perceived by people. They include learning, identity change, and meaning making processes. Secondly, processes of change are observed through a semiotic prism, articulating self-other-object-sense of the object for self, and located in a specific social frame. Transitions are thus analysed as reconfigurations of such semiotic prism. The paper proposes to highlight the role of institutions as social frames likely to facilitate, or constrain, such reconfigurations. The role of institutions in transitions is discussed through three case studies: the transition to vocational training, the transition out of a religious school, and the transition to work at war-time.     

Extinction produces context inhibition and multiple-context extinction reduces response recovery in human predictive learning

Two experiments with human participants were used to investigate recovery of an extinguished learned response after a context change using ABC designs. In an ABC design, the context changes over the three successive stages of acquisition (context A), extinction (context B), and test (context C). In both experiments, we found reduced recovery in groups that had extinction in multiple contexts, and that the extinction contexts acquired inhibitory strength. These results confirm those of previous investigations, that multiple-context extinction can produce less response recovery than single-context extinction, and they also provide new evidence for the involvement of contextual inhibitory processes in extinction in humans. The foregoing results are broadly in line with a protection-from-extinction account of response recovery. Yet, despite the fact that we detected contextual inhibition, predictions based on protection-from-extinction were not fully reliable for the single- and multiple-context group differences that we observed in (1) rates of extinction and (2) the strength of context inhibition. Thus, although evidence was obtained for a protection-from-extinction account of response recovery, this account can not explain all of the data.     

The mediating role of attribution and self-efficacy variables for treatment effects on achievement outcomes

This experiment explored the mediating functions of attributional and self-efficacy variables on achievement outcomes for skill training treatments offered in conjunction with attributional feedback. Children who were identified as learned helpless and deficient in division skills received training on division operations either through modeling strategies or self-instructional practice. Half of the sample in each treatment received attributional feedback on effort, ability, and task difficulty. All treatments were effective in raising post-test achievement but only the results from the two treatments including attributional feedback and the modeling only treatment demonstrated significant post-test superiority over the achievement of a control group. Treatment effects on the mediating variables were less substantial but path analysis demonstrated the viability of a hypothesized model which suggests that the indirect effect of skill training and attributional feedback on achievement is mediated through the attribution and self-efficacy variables. Future research on how children process attributional information needs to consider ways to measure the generalizability of alleviation of learned helplessness and increased self-efficacy on achievement outcomes.     

Peer assessment as a collaborative learning activity: The role of interpersonal variables and conceptions

The present study examined the role of interpersonal variables (psychological safety, value diversity, interdependence, and trust) and conceptions of peer assessment in vocational education. An intervention was conducted (N = 45) with a control group (N = 17), which indicated change in psychological safety, value diversity, and trust in the peer as an assessor. Furthermore, when comparing the intervention and control group, peer assessment contributed to psychological safety and lower value diversity. Perceived learning was predicted by value diversity and conceptions. Conceptions were predicted by psychological safety, value diversity, and trust in the self and in the peer as an assessor.     

A role of stimulus compounds in eliciting responses: Relatively spaced extinction following massed acquisition

One of two schedules of rewarded (R) and nonrewarded (N) trials (RNR vs. RRN) was combined factorially with intertrial interval (ITI) in acquisition (1 vs. 45 min), with extinction occurring at a 45-min ITI. The RNR schedule produced greater resistance to extinction than the RRN schedule regardless of acquisition ITI. The shift in ITI from acquisition to extinction reduced resistance to extinction slightly in the RNR group but not in the RRN group. These findings suggest that there are cues common to 1-min and 45-min ITIs. It was suggested that these ITI-associated cues enter into compound with memories to control instrumental responding.     

The pattern of responding after extensive extinction

Extensive extinction greatly reduces response rate and increases the relative frequency of short interresponse times, but does not affect temporal learning or operant response rate. In each of two experiments, 24 rats were trained in a multiple cued interval procedure with three stimuli (noise, light, and clicker) at three intervals (30, 60, and 120 sec). In Experiment 1, after 50 sessions of extinction, response rate decreased from about 25 to 0.5 responses/min, but temporal discriminations were maintained and the initial response gradients in reacquisition had a pattern that corresponded with the original (rather than current) training conditions. In Experiment 2, these results were replicated and extended by examination of the effect of stimulus duration on response patterns during extinction, but its lack of effect on reacquisition. The similarity of the initial performance in reacquisition to the asymptotic performance in acquisition was presumably due to the similarity of context. The individual subject data may be downloaded from www.psychonomic.org/archive.     

Training reinforcement rates,resistance to extinction,and the role of context in reinstatement

Behavior reduced as a consequence of extinction or intervention can relapse. According to behavioral momentum theory, the extent to which behavior persists and relapses once it has been eliminated depends on the relative training reinforcement rate among discriminative stimuli. In addition, studies of context renewal reveal that relapse depends on the similarity between the training stimulus context and the test stimulus context following disruption by extinction. In the present experiments with pigeons, we arranged different reinforcement rates in the presence of distinct discriminative stimuli across components of a multiple schedule. Following extinction, we attempted to reinstate responding in the presence of those target components with response-independent food presentations. Importantly, we arranged the reinstating food presentations either within the target components or in separate components, either paired with extinction (Experiment 1) or reinforcement (Experiment 2) during baseline. Reinstatement increased with greater training reinforcement rates when the reinstating food presentations were arranged in the target components and the separate components paired with reinforcement during training. Reinstatement was smaller and was not systematically related to training reinforcement rates in the target components when reinstating food presentation occurred in separate components paired with extinction. These findings suggest that relapse depends on the history of reinforcement associated with the discriminative stimuli in which the relapse-inducing event occurs.     

原创生物学试题中常见的问题与对策

1缺少新的问题情境或缺少对核心概念的考察 高考试题的核心目标是考察能力,试题要在新的问题情境下实现对核心概念的考察。目前原创模拟题中常缺少这两个必要条件。     

The use and misuse of extinction in classroom behavioral programs

The use of contingent ignoring to help reduce problems in the classroom has been advocated by behavioral psychologists, but in practice, teachers have found this procedure often is not successful. In fact, sometimes well-intentioned misuse of the ignoring technique exacerbates inappropriate behavior. This paper documents the difficulties found in using an ignoring procedure in the classroom. The potential mistakes (including not specifying target behavior; not taking a baseline; inadvertently, intermittently reinforcing the inappropriate behavior; reinforcing response bursts; reinforcing spontaneous recovery; and not reinforcing an appropriate alternative behavior) are described. For each potential problem, a remedy is prescribed. It is hoped that this paper will help bridge the gap between researchers and practitioners.     

The role of cultural identity as a learning factor in physics: a discussion through the role of science in Brazil

In recent decades, changes in society have deeply affected the internal organization and the main goals of schools. These changes are particularly important in science education because science is one of the major sources of change in peoples’ lives. This research provided the opportunity to investigate how these changes affect the way teachers develop their classroom activities. In this work, we focus on science as part of the cultural identity of a society and how this identity affects the process of teaching and learning inside the classroom. Other works have shown that certain social characteristics such as gender, race, religion, etc., can create a cultural barrier to learning science. This results in an obstacle between those particular students and the science that is taught, hindering their learning process. We first aim to present the notion of identity in education and in other related fields such as social psychology and sociology. Our main purpose is to focus on identity in a school setting and how that identity affects the relationship students have with the science content. Next, we present and analyze an intervention in the subject of Modern and Contemporary Physics composed by a sequence of activities in a private school in the region of Sao Paulo State, Brazil. This intervention serves to illustrate how scientific topics may be explored while considering aspects of cultural differences as an obstacle. The intervention was completed in two steps: first, in the classroom with a discussion concerning scientific works and nationality of scientists, with one being a Brazilian physicist; second, taking students to visit a particle collider at the University of São Paulo. One of the results of our research was realizing that students do not perceive science as something representative of the Brazilian cultural identity. At the same time, the activity gave the students the opportunity to make the connection between doing physical sciences at an international level and the national level in Brazil. The findings of this study suggest that it is possible to reshape the cultural identity of Brazilian students.     

The impact of context relevance during extinction learning

In two predictive-learning experiments, we investigated the role of the informational value of contexts for the formation of context-specific extinction learning. The contexts were each composed of two elements from two dimensions, A and B. In Phase 1 of each experiment, participants received acquisition training with a target cue Z in context A1B1 (the numbers assign particular values on the context dimensions). In Phase 2, participants were trained with conditional discriminations between two other cues, X and Y, for which only one of the two context dimensions was relevant. In a third phase, participants received extinction trials with cue Z in context A2B2. During a final test phase, we observed that a partial change of the extinction context disrupted extinction performance when the extinction context was changed on the dimension that had been trained as being relevant for the conditional discrimination. However, when the extinction context was changed on the irrelevant context dimension, extinction performance was not affected. Our results are consistent with the idea that relevant contexts receive more attention than do irrelevant contexts, leading to stronger context-specific processing of information learned in the former than in the latter type of contexts.     

Observational extinction: Observation of nonreinforced responding reduces resistance to extinction in rats

Rats trained to push a joystick to the left or right for food reward were given two successive tests in which neither response was reinforced. Prior to Test 1, subjects were either confined in the apparatus with a passive conspecific (Group None), or allowed to observe a conspecific demonstrator making 50 nonreinforced responses in the direction that had beeirrewarded during observer training (Group Same) or in the opposite direction (Group Different). In Test 1, Group Same made fewer previously reinforced responses than did Group Different, which made fewer than Group None, and Groups Same and Different each made fewer previously nonreinforced responses than did Group None. In Test 2, Group Same made fewer previously reinforced responses than did Group None. These results indicate that observation of nonreinforced responding can reduce resistance to extinction (Test 1) and spontaneous recovery (Test 2) in rats.