title: Use of a single-code/default strategy by pigeons to acquire duration sample discriminations.
abstract: Past evidence that pigeons may adopt a single-code/default strategy to solve duration sample discriminations may be attributable to the similarity between the intertrial interval (ITI) and the retention interval. The present experiments tested whether pigeons would adopt a single-code/default strategy when possible ITI-retention-interval ambiguity was eliminated and sample salience was increased. Previous studies of duration sample discriminations that have purported to show evidence for the use of a single-code/default coding strategy have used durations of 0, 2, and 10 sec (Zentall, Klein, and Singer, 2004). However, the results of Experiment 1 suggest that the use of a 0-sec sample may produce an artifact resulting in inadvertent present/absent sample matching. In Experiment 2, when pigeons were trained with three nonzero duration samples (2, 8, and 32 sec), clear evidence for the use of a single-code/default strategy was found.
authors.affiliation: Department of Psychology, University of Kentucky, Lexington, KY 40506-0044, USA. rasing2@uky.edu
authors.forename: Rebecca A
authors.initials: RA
authors.lastname: Singer
authors.forename: Emily D
authors.initials: ED
authors.lastname: Klein
authors.forename: Thomas R
authors.initials: TR
authors.lastname: Zentall
mesh_terms: D000818:Animals; D001522:Behavior, Animal / Q000502:physiology*; D010856:Columbidae; D004192:Discrimination, Psychological; D011930:Reaction Time; D012153:Retention, Psychology; D017603:Signal Detection, Psychological