Comportamento coordenado em ratos: efeitos da forma de distribuição do reforço entre indivíduos trabalhando em dupla
Resumen
The coordinated responding of pairs of rats that occur in close temporal proximity can
be conceived as a unit of cooperation which has been shown to be modulated by reinforcement
schedules, similar to individual responding. The central question of this study was whether
coordinated responding can be maintained when the reinforcers that are dependent on
coordination are alternately presented to one of two cooperating rats across cooperative
episodes. For this, tandem schedules with two components of Fixed Interval (tandem FI FI) or
Variable Interval (tandem VI VI) schedules were used, as the consequences of coordination
were alternately provided across the two rats. Individual and mutual reinforcement
contingencies were used as experimental controls. Coordinated responses were defined as a
unit involving two responses, one of each cooperating member, occurring within an interval of
0.2 s of one another. Each coordinated response was followed by a LED light for an interval of
0.2 s in all experimental conditions. Individual response rates increased systematically
throughout experimental sessions and conditions. Although the same schedules were used in
all three conditions, the individual reinforcement contingency (in which one’s reinforcer did
not depend on its patterning rat) resulted in a higher reinforcement rate. The alternating
reinforcement condition maintained coordinated responding, but the rates and proportions of
coordinated responses were lower than those observed under conditions in which reinforcement
was delivered to the pair members at the same time. This study showed that simultaneity in the
delivery of reinforcers to members of the cooperative episode can be a critical variable in the
operant selection of coordinated responding in pair of rats.
Colecciones
El ítem tiene asociados los siguientes ficheros de licencia: