Infant Proneness-to-Distress Temperament, Maternal Personality, and Mother-Infant Attachment: Associations and Goodness of Fit

66 mother-infant pairs were examined when the infants were 9 and 13 months. The purpose of this report was to examine relations between infant proneness-to-distress temperament, maternal personality characteristics, and mother-infant attachment. There were no main-effect relations between infant proneness-to-distress temperament as assessed at 9 months and infant attachment classification at 13 months. This was true whether security of attachment (A and C vs. B) or proposed temperament (A1-B2 vs. B3-C2) groupings of attachment classifications were examined. Infant proneness-to-distress temperament, however, was associated with maternal behavior and personality. Furthermore, security of attachment could be predicted by an interaction between maternal personality and infant proneness-to-distress. The importance of considering goodness-of-fit relations in predicting attachment security is discussed.     

Second-order conditioning: Different outcomes in fear and eyelid conditioning

Second-order conditioning has been frequently observed with the fear response but not with the eyelid response. The present experiments manipulated the temporal relationship between the second-order and first-order stimulus on second-order conditioning trials. Our results indicated that a trace second-order procedure is not effective with either response system. Second-order fear conditioning was most prominent when the second-order CS terminated at the onset of the first-order CS. This arrangement, however, did not produce second-order eyelid CRs. In eyelid conditioning, the second-order CS appears to inhibit responding to the first-order CS which immediately follows it.     

Discrimination of the number of sequential events by rats

Ten rats were trained to press a right lever following two successive sounds and to press a left lever following four successive sounds. Three sound sequences were used in initial discrimination training, such that reliable classification could not be based on the duration of each sound, the interval between sounds, or the total duration of the sound sequence. Classification of seven novel sound sequences suggested that the animals were either using number or the sum of sound durations in a sequence as the relevant cue. When this total sound duration was put in conflict with number, rats classified by number. The conclusion was that rats can discriminate number, even when temporal cues are controlled.     

Let the (Board) Games Begin: Creative Ways to Enhance Teaching and Learning

Gaming, in its many forms, is becoming a more active force in classrooms. To prepare preservice candidates for this trend, one teacher education program asked candidates (n = 60) to develop games in varied curricular fields tied to curriculum standards. This article describes the development of a model game, assignment requirements, provides a content review of eight games (geography and novels), their features, and highlights benefits and lessons learned from this experience.     

Symmetrical and asymmetrical sources of variance in temporal generalization

Ten rats were trained in a temporal generalization task (the peak procedure) with variations in the time of reinforcement, the intertrial interval, and the mean and variance of the duration of nonfood trials. There were three types of asymmetry in the temporal generalization gradients: positive skew, secondary rise, and positive asymptote. Asymmetrical gradients can occur as a result of asymmetrical sources of variance, multiplicative combinations of symmetrical sources of variance, and effects of anticipation of the end of a trial and the conditions of the next trial. Ten additional rats were trained with a single time of reinforcement, a limited time of reinforcement availability, long and fixed durations of nonfood trials, and a nonresponse requirement for ending a trial. These conditions markedly reduced all asymmetrical sources of variance and led to very symmetrical gradients. These results demonstrate that none of the asymmetrical sources of variance necessarily has a substantial influence on observed temporal generalization gradients.     

Serial pattern learning of temporal intervals

The problem was to determine how rats adjust the times of their lever responses to repeating sequences of interfood intervals. In Experiment 1, rats were trained on an interval schedule of reinforcement with a 12-element Fleshler-Hoffman series with a mean of 60 sec; the order was as follows: ascending, random with repetition, random with replacement, random without replacement. In Experiment 2, rats were trained with a 10-element ascending or descending series (from 2⁰ to 2⁹ sec), and in a ramp procedure in which these intervals increased and then decreased repeatedly. In the ascending, descending, and ramp conditions (but not in the random conditions), postreinforcement pause (PRP) was a function of the interval. PRP was most highly correlated with an interval later in the series. Theories of conditioning and timing based on the averaging of past experience must be modified to account for such anticipatory behavior.