title: Acquisition, extinction, and reacquisition of responding with delayed and immediate reinforcement.
abstract: The present study investigated acquisition, extinction, and reacquisition of free-operant responding when rats' lever presses produced water after a resetting delay of 0, 10, 20, or 30 s. Results indicated that: (1) responding was acquired rapidly at all delays without shaping or autoshaping; (2) resistance to extinction was directly related to delay length and inversely related to intermittency of reinforcement; (3) responding acquired with delayed reinforcement recovered less rapidly from extinction, and was less efficient, than responding acquired with immediate reinforcement. Comparing these results with those of studies using discrete-trials and free-operant procedures with no reinforcement delay suggest that the specific conditions under which behavior is maintained determines, in part, the behavioral effects of delay and intermittency of reinforcement.
authors.affiliation: Department of Psychology, Western Michigan University, Kalamazoo, MI 49008, USA.
authors.forename: T
authors.initials: T
authors.lastname: Byrne
authors.forename: G
authors.initials: G
authors.lastname: Sutphin
authors.forename: A
authors.initials: A
authors.lastname: Poling