Behavioural processes
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Behavioural processes · May 2004
Psychological distance to reward: equating the number of stimulus and response segments.
Psychological distance to reward, or the segmentation effect, refers to the preference for a terminal link of a concurrent-chains schedule consisting of a simple reinforcement schedule (e.g. fixed interval [FI] 30s) relative to its chained-schedule counterpart (e.g. chained FI 15s FI 15s). This experiment was conducted to examine whether the segmentation effect is due to the number of terminal-link stimulus and response segments per se. Three pigeons pecked under a concurrent-chains schedule in which identical variable-interval (VI) schedules operated in the initial links. ⋯ In addition, terminal-link response rates were relatively low. With the chained FI FI schedule terminal links, for each pigeon, there was relatively more preference for the alternating terminal link and terminal-link response rates increased relative to conditions with the chained FT FT schedule terminal links. These data suggest that the segmentation effect is not due simply to the number of terminal-link stimulus or response segments per se, but rather to a required period of responding during a stimulus segment that never is paired with reinforcement.