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Typical delay determines waiting time on periodic-food schedules: Static and dynamic tests.

Publication ,  Journal Article
Wynne, CD; Staddon, JE
Published in: Journal of the experimental analysis of behavior
September 1988

Pigeons and other animals soon learn to wait (pause) after food delivery on periodic-food schedules before resuming the food-rewarded response. Under most conditions the steady-state duration of the average waiting time, t, is a linear function of the typical interfood interval. We describe three experiments designed to explore the limits of this process. In all experiments, t was associated with one key color and the subsequent food delay, T, with another. In the first experiment, we compared the relation between t (waiting time) and T (food delay) under two conditions: when T was held constant, and when T was an inverse function of t. The pigeons could maximize the rate of food delivery under the first condition by setting t to a consistently short value; optimal behavior under the second condition required a linear relation with unit slope between t and T. Despite this difference in optimal policy, the pigeons in both cases showed the same linear relation, with slope less than one, between t and T. This result was confirmed in a second parametric experiment that added a third condition, in which T + t was held constant. Linear waiting appears to be an obligatory rule for pigeons. In a third experiment we arranged for a multiplicative relation between t and T (positive feedback), and produced either very short or very long waiting times as predicted by a quasi-dynamic model in which waiting time is strongly determined by the just-preceding food delay.

Duke Scholars

Published In

Journal of the experimental analysis of behavior

DOI

EISSN

1938-3711

ISSN

0022-5002

Publication Date

September 1988

Volume

50

Issue

2

Start / End Page

197 / 210

Related Subject Headings

  • Behavioral Science & Comparative Psychology
  • 5204 Cognitive and computational psychology
  • 5202 Biological psychology
  • 5201 Applied and developmental psychology
  • 1702 Cognitive Sciences
  • 1701 Psychology
 

Citation

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Wynne, C. D., & Staddon, J. E. (1988). Typical delay determines waiting time on periodic-food schedules: Static and dynamic tests. Journal of the Experimental Analysis of Behavior, 50(2), 197–210. https://doi.org/10.1901/jeab.1988.50-197
Wynne, C. D., and J. E. Staddon. “Typical delay determines waiting time on periodic-food schedules: Static and dynamic tests.Journal of the Experimental Analysis of Behavior 50, no. 2 (September 1988): 197–210. https://doi.org/10.1901/jeab.1988.50-197.
Wynne CD, Staddon JE. Typical delay determines waiting time on periodic-food schedules: Static and dynamic tests. Journal of the experimental analysis of behavior. 1988 Sep;50(2):197–210.
Wynne, C. D., and J. E. Staddon. “Typical delay determines waiting time on periodic-food schedules: Static and dynamic tests.Journal of the Experimental Analysis of Behavior, vol. 50, no. 2, Sept. 1988, pp. 197–210. Epmc, doi:10.1901/jeab.1988.50-197.
Wynne CD, Staddon JE. Typical delay determines waiting time on periodic-food schedules: Static and dynamic tests. Journal of the experimental analysis of behavior. 1988 Sep;50(2):197–210.

Published In

Journal of the experimental analysis of behavior

DOI

EISSN

1938-3711

ISSN

0022-5002

Publication Date

September 1988

Volume

50

Issue

2

Start / End Page

197 / 210

Related Subject Headings

  • Behavioral Science & Comparative Psychology
  • 5204 Cognitive and computational psychology
  • 5202 Biological psychology
  • 5201 Applied and developmental psychology
  • 1702 Cognitive Sciences
  • 1701 Psychology