Response independence, matching and maximizing: A reply to Heyman

G. Heyman's (see record 1980-00325-001) major criticism of the present authors' (see record 1979-22914-001) reinforcement maximization model is that it does not consider "local" and "interchangeover" interresponse times separately. The present authors show that this separation may not be necessary, since their assumption of independent, random responding to each alternative can account both for the observed equality of local response rates and, when the constraint on total responding is included, for the inverse relation between changeover rates and the degree of disparity between overall response rates to the 2 alternatives. (10 ref) (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2006 APA, all rights reserved).

Duke Scholars

Author John E. R. Staddon Psychology & Neuroscience