Increasing previous but not concurrent extinction attenuates the "extinction makes acquisition context specific" effect in human predictive learning.

Four experiments in human predictive learning evaluated whether the extinction makes the acquisition context specific (EMACS) effect is attenuated when the increase in prediction error that extinction produces disappears. Participants had to evaluate the relationship between a given food (cue) that was ingested by an imaginary client of a given restaurant (context) and a potential gastric illness (outcome). The task was implemented using Gorilla online software. All participants received the relevant training in context A, and equivalent exposure to context B. Cue E was presented paired with the outcome in all groups. Cue E was then either extinguished (group E) or not extinguished (group NE), either previously or concurrently to training of the target cue (P). P was then tested in contexts A and B. When extinction was conducted concurrently, performance to P became context-dependent regardless of the number of extinction trials (12 or 24)-the EMACS effect. The EMACS effect disappeared when extinction was elongated to 24 trials, and conducted before acquisition of P. Implications of these results for attentional explanations of context processing are discussed. (PsycInfo Database Record (c) 2024 APA, all rights reserved).

Open field activity is linked to, but is not affected by, the rate of recovery from reward downshift in female Wistar rats.

Frustration is an aversive emotion triggered by unexpected reward downshifts. Using the consummatory successive negative contrast (cSNC) task, a 32-to-2% sucrose downshift was shown to initially suppress consummatory behavior. Such suppression was followed by behavioral recovery over subsequent sessions. Individual differences often emerge in the rate of recovery after the initial consummatory suppression. These experiments were designed to determine whether a stable trait of sensation/novelty seeking (SNS) is related to such individual differences in recovery from reward downshift. In Experiment 1, open field (OF) activity in the central area served as a measure of SNS. A week later, animals received training in the cSNC task involving ten 5-min sessions of access to 32% sucrose followed by four sessions of access to 2% sucrose. Higher OF activity predicted greater consummatory suppression after downshift, but a steeper recovery rate across downshifted sessions. Controls not exposed to the OF showed cSNC, but downshifted animals performed at equivalent levels whether they had OF exposure or not. In Experiment 2, after a 32-to-2% sucrose downshift, fast vs. slow recovery animals displayed similar levels of central activity in the OF. In Experiment 3, animals exhibited similar levels of central activity whether after a 32-to-2% or an 8-to-2% sucrose downshift. In both experiments, activity levels were similar whether immediately after session 12 (onset of recovery) or after session 15 (fully recovered). These results suggest that individual variations in recovery from reward downshift are correlated with levels of SNS as a stable trait.

Further evidence for the role of temporal contiguity as a determinant of overshadowing.

Three experiments explored whether weakening temporal contiguity between auditory cues and an aversive outcome attenuated cue competition in an avoidance learning task with human participants. Overall, with strong temporal contiguity between auditory cues and the outcome during training (the offset of the predictive auditory signals concurred with the onset of the outcome), the target cue trained as part of a compound yielded less avoidance behaviour than the control cue trained alone, an instance of overshadowing. However, weakening temporal contiguity during training (inserting a 5-s trace) attenuated overshadowing, resulting in similar avoidance behaviour in response to the control and target cues. These results provide evidence that, as predicted by a recent modification of Pearce's configural theory, temporal contiguity is critical for determining cue competition.

Behavioral and neural correlates of licking for 66% alcohol in Wistar rats: Caloric balance or sensation/novelty seeking?

Whereas rodents generally reject high alcohol concentrations, access to 66% alcohol can reinforce operant licking in a progressive ratio situation. Three experiments were conducted to identify a potential mechanism underlying this effect. In Experiment 1, food-restricted male and female Wistar rats received access to either 66% alcohol or water in their home cage for one hour over four sessions. Consumption of alcohol and water was similar, showing that rats neither preferred nor rejected 66% alcohol. Peripheral (but not central) activity in an open field (OF) was higher after access to 66% alcohol than water, a result inconsistent with motor impairment. Blood alcohol concentration was higher after 66% alcohol than water and was positively correlated with fluid displacement and peripheral distance in the OF. c-Fos immunoreactivity after exposure to 66% alcohol vs. water showed increased activation in the nucleus accumbens shell, anterior cingulate cortex, and insular cortex. In Experiment 2, whether access to food was restricted (to an 81-84% of the ad libitum weight) or free (ad libitum), female Wistar rats licked at similar frequency from a sipper tube delivering 66% alcohol. This result is inconsistent with an account based on the caloric content of 66% alcohol. In Experiment 3, food-restricted male and female Wistar rats exhibited a positive correlation between activity in the central area of an OF (an index of sensation/novelty seeking) and licking for 66% alcohol. These results are consistent with the hypothesis that the reinforcing value of 66% alcohol is related to sensation/novelty seeking.

Reversing the relationship between a nontarget cue and the outcome facilitates subsequent human predictive learning.

Two experiments were conducted to test the effect of experiencing associative interference on later learning. A predictive learning task was used in which human participants had to evaluate whether plants would grow or not (Outcome) after being watered with different fertilizers (Cues). Experiment 1 found that the increase in the prediction error produced by following a pre-exposed nontarget cue by the outcome, facilitated subsequent acquisition of the relationship between the pre-exposed target cue and the outcome. Experiment 2 compared whether learning about the target cue was differentially affected by experiencing two types of associative interference with the nontarget cue: Pairing the pre-exposed cue with the outcome and presenting the cue without outcome after being paired with it. The experience of associative interference with nontarget cues similarly facilitated subsequent learning about the target cue, regardless of the direction of the change in the nontarget cue-outcome relationship. It is suggested that the increase in prediction error produced by the experience of associative interference may lead to a general increase in attention that facilitates subsequent learning.

Concurrent evidence of extinction making acquisition context specific and ABA and ABC renewal effects in human predictive learning.

Two experiments evaluated whether the experience of extinction makes acquisition context specific (EMACS) while the extinction learning itself also becomes context dependent under ABA and ABC renewal designs in a human predictive learning situation. Two groups of participants received X-Outcome pairings in context A followed by P-Outcome pairings in context B. For participants in group E, cue X was then extinguished in context B while cue P was trained. Participants in group NE were trained with P, but they did not have the extinction experience. Testing target cues outside the context B (i.e. the context in which P was trained and X was extinguished) in group E led to an increase in responding to cue X (Renewal effect) and a decrease in responding to cue P (EMACS effect) regardless of whether the test was conducted in context A (Experiment 1) or in an alternative context C (Experiment 2). Combined results suggest that Renewal and EMACS effects may be based on the same underlying mechanism. (PsycInfo Database Record (c) 2021 APA, all rights reserved).

Extinction contexts fail to transfer control: Implications for conditioned inhibition and occasion-setting accounts of renewal.

The renewal effect is often explained as a side effect of the extinction context acting as a negative occasion setter. Four experiments tested whether extinction contexts show the selective-transfer property of occasion setters. Experiments 1-3 used a predictive judgment task where participants rated the probability of certain foods (cues) producing gastric malaise (outcomes) in different restaurants (contexts). Experiment 4 used a behavioral suppression task where sensor lights (cues) served as signals to suppress firing responses in certain galaxies (contexts). All 4 (Experiments 1-4) addressed whether a potentially negative occasion-setting context transferred its modulatory power to an extinguished (presumably occasion set) target in the test phase of an ABC renewal design. Experiments 2-4 further assessed the possibility that the extinction context acts as a conditioned inhibitor by testing a simple excitor on a context where extinction occurred. Neither selective (occasion-setting) nor nonselective transfer (conditioned inhibition) was demonstrated. Implications for theories of renewal and occasion-setting are discussed. (PsycInfo Database Record (c) 2020 APA, all rights reserved).

Prior extinction increases acquisition context specificity in human predictive learning.

One experiment evaluated the effect of extinction on the context dependence of non-extinguished information in a situation in which physical (images), rather than predominantly verbal, contexts were used in human predictive learning. Participants received training in which different foods (Cues) were associated with the presence or the absence of gastric illness (outcome) in customers of different restaurants (contexts). One cue was associated with the gastric illness while a different cue was either extinguished or not between groups. A change in the context at test led to a general decrease in both predictive judgments and the speed of responding to the non-extinguished cue. However, these decreases were greater when training was conducted during extinction of the different cue demonstrating the extinction makes acquisition context-specific (EMACS) effect. Results are contrasted with failures to find the effect in other reports and discussed in terms of extinction leading to an allocation of attentional resources to the context, facilitating the context dependence of information.

Attentional perspectives on context-dependence of information retrieval

Attention has been traditionally understood as an important factor on acquiring new information. A review of the literature suggests that attention, specifically attention to the contexts, also plays a relevant role on information retrieval. It also shows that attention to the contexts is modulated by the ambiguity of the situation, and the informative value contexts have. The virtues and limitations of different attentional theories of learning applied to the explanation of the effects of context change on retrieval of the information are discussed. This analysis uncovers the weaknesses of current research on context processing that should be corrected by future research: The need of independent measures of attention to the contexts, the evaluation of the mechanisms of contextual control, and the possibility of taking an evolutionary perspective on the effects of context change (AU)

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Context specificity of extinguished schedule-induced drinking within an ABA renewal design in rats / Especificidad contextual de la extinción de la bebida inducida por programa en un diseño de renovación ABA en ratas

The main goal of this study was to explore whether extinction of schedule-induced adjunctive drinking (polydipsia) may become under contextual control. Drinking was induced by a Fixed-Time 30 sec food delivery schedule (FT30). Experiment 1 used a 2 x 2 factorial design with Schedule (FT30 vs. food a the start of the session), and Stimulus (Presenceor absence of a 10 sec tone at the end of each 30 sec period within a session) as factors. Acquisition and extinction were conducted in two different contexts, returning to the acquisition context at testing. Experiment 2 tested contextual control of extinction against a control that remained in the extinction context at testing. Recovery from extinction was observed as an increase in water intake (as well as in magazine entries) during the test, regardless of the presence of the tone. Implications for theunderstanding of schedule-induced drinking as a conditioned response are discusse (AU)

El objetivo principal de este estudio fue evaluar si la extinción de la bebida adjuntiva inducida por programa (polidipsia) podía quedar bajo control contextual. La bebida se indujo mediante un programa de administración de comida de tiempo fijo 30 segundos (TF30). El experimento 1 utilizó un diseño factorial 2 x 2 con Programa (TF30 vs. comida al inicio de la sesión) y Estímulo (presencia o ausencia de un sonido de 10s al final de cada periodo de 30s dentro de la sesión)como factores. La adquisición y la extinción se realizaron en contextos diferentes, regresando al contexto de adquisición durante la prueba. El experimento 2 introdujo una condición de control que recibió la prueba en el contexto de extinción. La recuperación de la extinción se observó como un aumento en la ingesta de agua (así como en las entradas en el comedero) durante la prueba, independientemente de la presencia del sonido. Se discuten las implicaciones de estos resultados para la interpretación de la bebida inducida por programa como una respuesta condicionada (AU)