- Email: [email protected]
Mechanical facilitation of the action of response prevention (flooding) in rats
Bchav.
Res.
& Therapy.
1970, Vol.
8, pp. 43 to 48.
Pcrgamon
Press.
Printed
in England
MECHANICAL FACILITATION OF THE ACTION OF RESPONSE PREVENTION (FLOODING) IN RATS* ISRAEL LEDERHENDLER and MORRIE BAUM Department
of Psychology,
McGill University,
(Received 16 Jdy
Montreal, Canada
1969)
Summary-Rats were trained to avoid intense electric shock and following learning, some groups were (Response prevention consisted of thwarting the given a response-prevention (flooding) treatment. avoidance response while forcing S to remain in the presence of the feared stimulus). The results confirmed that a brief period of response prevention which has been found effective in hastening the extinction of an avoidance response learned under mild shock motivation was nor effective when intense shock was employed. Mechanically disrupting .Ss’ behaviour during response prevention (interfering with the occurrence of abortive avoidance activity or freezing while forcing exploration and locomotion about the feared situation) was found to increase markedly the efficacy of the response prevention treatment in producing extinction. These results were interpreted as support for the view that the occurrence of non-fear behaviour (“relaxation”) during response prevention was necessary for the treatment to be effective in hastening the extinction of the avoidance response. THE GREAT resistance
to extinction of avoidance responding has been frequently noted and because of the similarity of this finding in animals to persistent anxiety-motivated behaviour in man, many attempts have been made to develop procedures which hasten extinction. One such procedure is “response prevention” or “flooding” (Polin, 1959; Baum, 1966,1968), and it consists of forcing the animal to remain in the presence of the stimulus which it fears while avoidance responses are prevented or blocked. Unlike desensitization therapy with humans (Wolpe, 1958), where exposure to the fear stimulus or object proceeds gradually through progressive steps, response prevention “floods” the animal with the full-strength fear stimulus, usually for a protracted period of time. Either because it produces the Pavlovian extinction of classically conditioned fear or because it leads to the learning of competing responses, the forced exposure to the feared stimulus while the response is prevented facilitates extinction. A behaviour-therapy analogue to response prevention has been termed “implosive therapy” (Hogan and Kirchner, 1967; Stampfl, 1967). The experimental animal literature indicates that response prevention or flooding can be very effective in hastening the extinction of an avoidance response (e.g. Baum, 1966). Some of the factors which determine the efficacy of response prevention include the extent to which the response has been overtrained (Baum, 1968), the amount of response prevention given (Weinberger, 1965; Baum, 1969a), and the intensity of the fear underlying the avoidance response (Baum, 1969a). In the last instance, when intense electric shock was used to motivate the learning of the avoidance response it was found that a brief period of response prevention did not lead to the extinction of the response (while the same amount of response prevention was effective when milder fear motivated the response). * This research was supported by a grant (No. APA-253) to Morrie Baum from the National Research Council of Canada.
43
44
ISRAELLEDERHENDLER
and MORRIEBAUM
The present study was designed to find ways to increase the efficacy of response prevention in facilitating the extinction of an avoidance response motivated by intense fear. In a previous study with the same objective (Baum, 1969b), it was found that the presence of other, non-fearful animals during response prevention increased the efficacy of the treatment (“social facilitation” effect). Observation of the rats’ behaviour during response prevention during this study and another previous one (Baum, 1969a) suggested that it was necessary for the subject to cease fear behaviour (abortive avoidance activity, freezing) and engage in relaxational behaviour (grooming , general activity) during response prevention if rapid extinction of the avoidance response was to occur subsequently. This leads to the possibility that mechanically disrupting the rat’s fearful behaviour and forcibly causing it to explore the feared situation during response prevention might enhance the efficacy of the response prevention treatment in hastening extinction. This experiment was designed to test for such mechanical facilitation of the action of response prevention in rats.
METHOD Subjects The experimental Ss were 45 female albino rats of the Sprague-Dawley strain obtained from the Canadian Breeding Laboratory and weighing 145-250 grams at the time of testing. Ss were maintained two to a cage in a constantly lit colony room with food and water always available.
The apparatus used was entirely automated and was the same as that described extensively in previous studies (Baum, 1965, 1966). Briefly, it consisted of a large plywood and Plexiglas box fitted with a grid floor through which scrambled electric shock could be administered. The shock generator was commercially made (Grason-Stadler model #E1064GS) and the intensity was set at 1.3 mA. Into one side of the cube-shaped box projected a 23 in. wide safety ledge. The rat could escape or avoid shock by jumping or climbing onto the ledge, where its presence was detected by a photocell system. The safety ledge was automatically retractable (via an electric motor device) and a quick retraction of the ledge resulted in the rat’s falling to the grid floor. A change in the original avoidance apparatus was made to permit mechanically forcing S to explore the avoidance box in response prevention. The change consisted of a modified ceiling for the box, sketched in Fig. 1. Through the ceiling (C) passed a movable metal shaft (S), 3/16 in. dia. and 1st in. high. The shaft could be slid down to a distance of $ in. above the grid floor during response prevention, or withdrawn out of the rat’s way during avoidance acquisition and extinction. Attached to the bottom of the shaft was a rectangular plastic “paddle” (1-i in. high x 52 in. lon g, P in Fig. 1). By rotating a handle (H) outside of the avoidance box the paddle could be used to force the rat to explore the box during response prevention. Procedure The procedure consisted of three phases. Stage I---avoidance training. Avoidance training
was the same for all three groups in the
MECHANICAL
FACILITATION
OF THE ACTION OF RESPONSE
PREVENTION
IN RATS
45
FIG. 1. Sketch of the device used to provide mechanical facilitation. During response prevention, the shaft (S) could be lowered into the avoidance box through the ceiling (C). Then, by rotating the handle (H) on the outside of the box, the paddle (P) could be employed to force the rat to explore and walk about the feared grid floor.
Without prior habituation to the apparatus, each rat was dropped onto the grid floor via the sliding ceiling. 10 sec. after the rat had landed on the grid, the grid was electrified and S received foot-shock until it escaped by jumping or climbing onto the safety ledge. The rat was allowed to remain on the ledge for 30 sec. (the inter-trial interval), after which the ledge was automatically retracted, causing S to fall to the grid floor and thus initiating the next training trial. Throughout training, the rat was permitted to avoid receiving shock by jumping or climbing onto the ledge within 10 sec. of having been knocked down onto the grid. Each rat was trained until it attained a learning criterion of ten consecutive avoidance responses.
experiment.
Stage 2-responseprevention. After attaining the acquisition criterion, Ss were removed from the box and placed in a nearby plastic restraining pail for 60 sec., following which two of the three groups of Ss were given response prevention. Response prevention consisted of manually disengaging the safety ledge and keeping it retracted from the apparatus for 5 min. During this time the rat was forced to remain on the grid floor (presence on the grid floor being the effective fear stimulus for S). During response prevention, Ss in Group MF (n= 15) received mechanical facilitation, that is, the paddle device shown in Fig. 1 was lowered into the box and slowly rotated. Rotation was not necessarily clockwise or counterclockwise but only was in the direction and at a rate which-could push or otherwise move the animal harmlessly about the grid floor. Thus Ss in Group MF were kept from displaying abortive avoidance behaviour or freezing during response prevention, and instead were forced to “relax”, that is, to explore and move about the feared grid floor.
46
ISRAEL
LEDERHENDLER
and
~~OWEBAUM
Ss in Group RP (n= 15) also received the 5 min. period of response prevention after The paddle device was lowered acquisition, however no mechanical facilitation occurred. into the box as it was for Group MF Ss, however it remained motionless during response prevention for Group RP, thus permitting these Ss to engage in fear behaviour (abortive avoidance, freezing). A control group, Group C (n = 15), received no response prevention but rather spent 7 consecutive min. in the restraining pail following avoidance training and prior to extinction testing. Stage 3-extinction testing. When the response-prevention interval of 5 min. had elapsed, Ss in the experimental groups were manually removed from the apparatus and pail for an additional one min. period. During this placed in the nearby restraining minute, E raised the paddle device away from the grid floor and out of S’s way, re-inserted the safety ledge into the apparatus, and re-engaged the spring-motor mechanism which carried out the automatic retraction. At the end of the one min. in the restraining pail (7 min. for Ss in Group C), the rat was returned to the avoidance apparatus and placed onto the safety ledge, thus starting the inter-trial interval preceding the first extinction trial. The extinction trials were identical to the acquisition trials in every respect, except that the Extinction was the same shocker was disconnected so that no shocks could be administered. for all three groups and proceeded until each S attained an extinction criterion of 5 consecutive min. on the grid floor without responding (when the response was now possible).
RESULTS The behaviour of the three groups during acquisition and extinction is summarized in Table 1. Acquisition was similar across the groups and when a Kruskal-Wallis one-way TABLE 1. SUMMARY OF THE AQUISITION AND EXTINCTION OF THE AVOIDANCE RESPONSE r~ THREE GROUPSOFRATS. GROUP C, ACONTROLGROUP,RECElMDONLYATIMEDELAY INANEUTRALSITUATION BETWEEN ACQUISITION AND EXTINCX-ION,WHILE GROUP RP RECEIVED 5 MIN. OF RESPONSE PREVENTION (FLOODING). GROUP MF, THE MECHANICAL FACILITATTON GROUP, RECEIVED 5 MIN. OF RESPONSE PREVENTION, DURING WHICH SS WERE MECHANICALLY INDUCED TO MOVE ABOUT AND EXPLORE THE FEARED SITUATION
Mean trial of the first avoidance in aquisition Mean trial avoidance
Mean number
of
shocks
Group RP (n= 15)
Group C (n=15)
Kruskal-Wallis Hor,ya
6.2
6.2
5.7
27.0
21.5
24.5
10.9
7.1
8.1
H=2.76,
p > 0.10
6.9
25.8
49.4
H=9.10,
p-co.02
response
of the tenth consecutive response in acquisition
Mean number acquisition
Group MF (n=15)
received
H=O.ll,p>O.lO
H=2.13,p>O.10
in
of responses in extinction
Proportion of Ss making in extinction
zero responses
Proportion of .Ss making responses in extinction
more than ten
9115
3115
3/15
l/l5
2115
11/15
xa=8.91,p
x*=8.57,
p-zO.02
MECHANICAL
FACILITATION
OF THE ACTION
OF RESPONSE PREVENTION
IN RATS
47
analysis of variance by ranks (Siegel, 1956) was applied to each of three learning measures, data substantiated there were no significant acquisition effects. In general the acquisition previous findings that learning was extremely rapid using this automated apparatus and procedure. As seen in Table 1, there was a significant effect of the response-prevention treatments upon the number of responses made during extinction. Group MF made significantly or Group RP (V=58.5, p 0.10). All of the above statistical comparisons Mann-Whitney U-test (Siegel, 1956). Thus, mechanical facilitation of response prevention was obtained, with Group MFmaking fewer extinction responses than any ofthe other groups. DISCUSSION This experiment has again confirmed that a brief period of response prevention (5 min.) is by itself not effective in leading to the extinction of an avoidance response learned under intense shock motivation (I.3 ma.). Mechanically disrupting the rat’s behaviour with the paddle device greatly increased the eficacy of response prevention. lvlechanical facilitation in response prevention consisted of interfering with S’s expression of fear behaviour, namely freezing and abortive avoidance activity (the latter consisting of frantic searching for the removed safety ledge in response prevention, upward leaps from the grid floor, and behaviour oriented towards where the safety ledge had been). By forcing S to explore the feared grid floor of the avoidance apparatus, mechanical facilitation apparently helped to induce “relaxation” in the fearful situation during response prevention. The findings of this experiment are relevant to theories of why response prevention or flooding is effective in hastening the extinction of an avoidance response. Page (1955) maintained that response prevention eliminated the avoidance response, but that the underlying fear remained and motivated a new competing response such as freezing. Unless undifferentiated movement about the avoidance box is considered as a competing response, the mechanical facilitation of response prevention obtained in this study is not consistent with Page’s theory. Rather the results are consistent with the view that response prevention is effective because it leads to the learning of relaxational responses to the previously feared stimuli, a view suggested in previous papers (Baum, 1969a, 1969b). Thus, the cessation of fear behaviour and the occurrence of relaxational responses predict the success of the action of response prevention. Relaxational behaviour in response prevention will occur spontaneously with the passage of time (Baum, 1969a), can be facilitated by the presence of other rats (social facilitation-Baum, 1969b), or by mechanical means, as in this study. The present study showed mechanical facilitation of the action of response prevention suggests a parsimonious explanation of the previous study which demonstrated “social” facilitation (Baum, 1969b). Previously it was shown that the presence of other, nonfearful rats along with the experimental S in response prevention made the treatment more effective in hastening the extinction of the avoidance response. Systematic observation of the experimental S’s spontaneous behaviour durin g response prevention showed that the presence of other rats served to decrease fear behaviour and increase relaxational responses on the part of the experimental S. The present study suggests that the social facilitation effect previously obtained is not truly a “social” phenomenon, but rather just another means of inducing mechanical facilitation. Other rats in the avoidance box during response prevention may act just as the paddle device in the present study.
48
ISRAEL
LEDERHENDLER and MORRIE
BAUM
REFERENCES BAUM M. (1965) An automated apparatus for the avoidance training of rats. Psychof. Rep. IS, 1205-1211. BAUM M. (1966) Rapid extinction of an avoidance response following a period of response prevention in the avoidance apparatus. Psychol. Rep. 18, 59-64. BAIJM M. (1968) Efficacy of response prevention (flooding) in facilitating the extinction of an avoidance response in rats: The effect of overtraining the response. Behav. Res. & Therapy 6, 197-203. BAUM M. (1969a) Extinction of an avoidance response following response prevention: Some parametric investigations. Can. J. Psychol. 23, l-10. BALJMM. (1969b) Extinction of an avoidance response motivated by intense fear: Social facilitation of the action of response prevention (flooding) in rats. Behav. Res. & Therapy 7, 57-62. HOGAN R. A. and KIRCHNERJ. H. (1967) Preliminary report of the extinction of learned fears via shortterm implosive therapy. J. abnorm. Psycho/. 72, 106-109. PAGE H. A. (1955) The facilitation of experimental extinction by response prevention as a function of the acquisition of a new response. J. camp. physiol. Psychol. 48, 14-16. POLIN A. T. (1959) The effect of flooding and physical suppression as extinction techniques on an anxietymotivated avoidance locomotor response. J. Psychof. 47, 253-255. SIEGEL S. (1956) Nonparametric Statistics for the Behavioral Sciences. McGraw-Hill, New York. STAMPFLT. G. (1967) Implosive therapy: The theory. In Behaviour Modificafion Techniques in the Treatmenf of Emotional Disorders (Ed. S. G. AFCMTAGE).Veterans Administration Publication, Battle Creek, Mich. WEINBERGERN. M. (1965) Effect of detainment on extinction of avoidance responses. J. camp. physiol. Psychol. 60, 135-138. WOLPE J. (1958) Psychotherapy by Reciprocal Inhibition. Stanford University Press, Stanford.
Res.
& Therapy.
1970, Vol.
8, pp. 43 to 48.
Pcrgamon
Press.
Printed
in England
MECHANICAL FACILITATION OF THE ACTION OF RESPONSE PREVENTION (FLOODING) IN RATS* ISRAEL LEDERHENDLER and MORRIE BAUM Department
of Psychology,
McGill University,
(Received 16 Jdy
Montreal, Canada
1969)
Summary-Rats were trained to avoid intense electric shock and following learning, some groups were (Response prevention consisted of thwarting the given a response-prevention (flooding) treatment. avoidance response while forcing S to remain in the presence of the feared stimulus). The results confirmed that a brief period of response prevention which has been found effective in hastening the extinction of an avoidance response learned under mild shock motivation was nor effective when intense shock was employed. Mechanically disrupting .Ss’ behaviour during response prevention (interfering with the occurrence of abortive avoidance activity or freezing while forcing exploration and locomotion about the feared situation) was found to increase markedly the efficacy of the response prevention treatment in producing extinction. These results were interpreted as support for the view that the occurrence of non-fear behaviour (“relaxation”) during response prevention was necessary for the treatment to be effective in hastening the extinction of the avoidance response. THE GREAT resistance
to extinction of avoidance responding has been frequently noted and because of the similarity of this finding in animals to persistent anxiety-motivated behaviour in man, many attempts have been made to develop procedures which hasten extinction. One such procedure is “response prevention” or “flooding” (Polin, 1959; Baum, 1966,1968), and it consists of forcing the animal to remain in the presence of the stimulus which it fears while avoidance responses are prevented or blocked. Unlike desensitization therapy with humans (Wolpe, 1958), where exposure to the fear stimulus or object proceeds gradually through progressive steps, response prevention “floods” the animal with the full-strength fear stimulus, usually for a protracted period of time. Either because it produces the Pavlovian extinction of classically conditioned fear or because it leads to the learning of competing responses, the forced exposure to the feared stimulus while the response is prevented facilitates extinction. A behaviour-therapy analogue to response prevention has been termed “implosive therapy” (Hogan and Kirchner, 1967; Stampfl, 1967). The experimental animal literature indicates that response prevention or flooding can be very effective in hastening the extinction of an avoidance response (e.g. Baum, 1966). Some of the factors which determine the efficacy of response prevention include the extent to which the response has been overtrained (Baum, 1968), the amount of response prevention given (Weinberger, 1965; Baum, 1969a), and the intensity of the fear underlying the avoidance response (Baum, 1969a). In the last instance, when intense electric shock was used to motivate the learning of the avoidance response it was found that a brief period of response prevention did not lead to the extinction of the response (while the same amount of response prevention was effective when milder fear motivated the response). * This research was supported by a grant (No. APA-253) to Morrie Baum from the National Research Council of Canada.
43
44
ISRAELLEDERHENDLER
and MORRIEBAUM
The present study was designed to find ways to increase the efficacy of response prevention in facilitating the extinction of an avoidance response motivated by intense fear. In a previous study with the same objective (Baum, 1969b), it was found that the presence of other, non-fearful animals during response prevention increased the efficacy of the treatment (“social facilitation” effect). Observation of the rats’ behaviour during response prevention during this study and another previous one (Baum, 1969a) suggested that it was necessary for the subject to cease fear behaviour (abortive avoidance activity, freezing) and engage in relaxational behaviour (grooming , general activity) during response prevention if rapid extinction of the avoidance response was to occur subsequently. This leads to the possibility that mechanically disrupting the rat’s fearful behaviour and forcibly causing it to explore the feared situation during response prevention might enhance the efficacy of the response prevention treatment in hastening extinction. This experiment was designed to test for such mechanical facilitation of the action of response prevention in rats.
METHOD Subjects The experimental Ss were 45 female albino rats of the Sprague-Dawley strain obtained from the Canadian Breeding Laboratory and weighing 145-250 grams at the time of testing. Ss were maintained two to a cage in a constantly lit colony room with food and water always available.
The apparatus used was entirely automated and was the same as that described extensively in previous studies (Baum, 1965, 1966). Briefly, it consisted of a large plywood and Plexiglas box fitted with a grid floor through which scrambled electric shock could be administered. The shock generator was commercially made (Grason-Stadler model #E1064GS) and the intensity was set at 1.3 mA. Into one side of the cube-shaped box projected a 23 in. wide safety ledge. The rat could escape or avoid shock by jumping or climbing onto the ledge, where its presence was detected by a photocell system. The safety ledge was automatically retractable (via an electric motor device) and a quick retraction of the ledge resulted in the rat’s falling to the grid floor. A change in the original avoidance apparatus was made to permit mechanically forcing S to explore the avoidance box in response prevention. The change consisted of a modified ceiling for the box, sketched in Fig. 1. Through the ceiling (C) passed a movable metal shaft (S), 3/16 in. dia. and 1st in. high. The shaft could be slid down to a distance of $ in. above the grid floor during response prevention, or withdrawn out of the rat’s way during avoidance acquisition and extinction. Attached to the bottom of the shaft was a rectangular plastic “paddle” (1-i in. high x 52 in. lon g, P in Fig. 1). By rotating a handle (H) outside of the avoidance box the paddle could be used to force the rat to explore the box during response prevention. Procedure The procedure consisted of three phases. Stage I---avoidance training. Avoidance training
was the same for all three groups in the
MECHANICAL
FACILITATION
OF THE ACTION OF RESPONSE
PREVENTION
IN RATS
45
FIG. 1. Sketch of the device used to provide mechanical facilitation. During response prevention, the shaft (S) could be lowered into the avoidance box through the ceiling (C). Then, by rotating the handle (H) on the outside of the box, the paddle (P) could be employed to force the rat to explore and walk about the feared grid floor.
Without prior habituation to the apparatus, each rat was dropped onto the grid floor via the sliding ceiling. 10 sec. after the rat had landed on the grid, the grid was electrified and S received foot-shock until it escaped by jumping or climbing onto the safety ledge. The rat was allowed to remain on the ledge for 30 sec. (the inter-trial interval), after which the ledge was automatically retracted, causing S to fall to the grid floor and thus initiating the next training trial. Throughout training, the rat was permitted to avoid receiving shock by jumping or climbing onto the ledge within 10 sec. of having been knocked down onto the grid. Each rat was trained until it attained a learning criterion of ten consecutive avoidance responses.
experiment.
Stage 2-responseprevention. After attaining the acquisition criterion, Ss were removed from the box and placed in a nearby plastic restraining pail for 60 sec., following which two of the three groups of Ss were given response prevention. Response prevention consisted of manually disengaging the safety ledge and keeping it retracted from the apparatus for 5 min. During this time the rat was forced to remain on the grid floor (presence on the grid floor being the effective fear stimulus for S). During response prevention, Ss in Group MF (n= 15) received mechanical facilitation, that is, the paddle device shown in Fig. 1 was lowered into the box and slowly rotated. Rotation was not necessarily clockwise or counterclockwise but only was in the direction and at a rate which-could push or otherwise move the animal harmlessly about the grid floor. Thus Ss in Group MF were kept from displaying abortive avoidance behaviour or freezing during response prevention, and instead were forced to “relax”, that is, to explore and move about the feared grid floor.
46
ISRAEL
LEDERHENDLER
and
~~OWEBAUM
Ss in Group RP (n= 15) also received the 5 min. period of response prevention after The paddle device was lowered acquisition, however no mechanical facilitation occurred. into the box as it was for Group MF Ss, however it remained motionless during response prevention for Group RP, thus permitting these Ss to engage in fear behaviour (abortive avoidance, freezing). A control group, Group C (n = 15), received no response prevention but rather spent 7 consecutive min. in the restraining pail following avoidance training and prior to extinction testing. Stage 3-extinction testing. When the response-prevention interval of 5 min. had elapsed, Ss in the experimental groups were manually removed from the apparatus and pail for an additional one min. period. During this placed in the nearby restraining minute, E raised the paddle device away from the grid floor and out of S’s way, re-inserted the safety ledge into the apparatus, and re-engaged the spring-motor mechanism which carried out the automatic retraction. At the end of the one min. in the restraining pail (7 min. for Ss in Group C), the rat was returned to the avoidance apparatus and placed onto the safety ledge, thus starting the inter-trial interval preceding the first extinction trial. The extinction trials were identical to the acquisition trials in every respect, except that the Extinction was the same shocker was disconnected so that no shocks could be administered. for all three groups and proceeded until each S attained an extinction criterion of 5 consecutive min. on the grid floor without responding (when the response was now possible).
RESULTS The behaviour of the three groups during acquisition and extinction is summarized in Table 1. Acquisition was similar across the groups and when a Kruskal-Wallis one-way TABLE 1. SUMMARY OF THE AQUISITION AND EXTINCTION OF THE AVOIDANCE RESPONSE r~ THREE GROUPSOFRATS. GROUP C, ACONTROLGROUP,RECElMDONLYATIMEDELAY INANEUTRALSITUATION BETWEEN ACQUISITION AND EXTINCX-ION,WHILE GROUP RP RECEIVED 5 MIN. OF RESPONSE PREVENTION (FLOODING). GROUP MF, THE MECHANICAL FACILITATTON GROUP, RECEIVED 5 MIN. OF RESPONSE PREVENTION, DURING WHICH SS WERE MECHANICALLY INDUCED TO MOVE ABOUT AND EXPLORE THE FEARED SITUATION
Mean trial of the first avoidance in aquisition Mean trial avoidance
Mean number
of
shocks
Group RP (n= 15)
Group C (n=15)
Kruskal-Wallis Hor,ya
6.2
6.2
5.7
27.0
21.5
24.5
10.9
7.1
8.1
H=2.76,
p > 0.10
6.9
25.8
49.4
H=9.10,
p-co.02
response
of the tenth consecutive response in acquisition
Mean number acquisition
Group MF (n=15)
received
H=O.ll,p>O.lO
H=2.13,p>O.10
in
of responses in extinction
Proportion of Ss making in extinction
zero responses
Proportion of .Ss making responses in extinction
more than ten
9115
3115
3/15
l/l5
2115
11/15
xa=8.91,p
x*=8.57,
p-zO.02
MECHANICAL
FACILITATION
OF THE ACTION
OF RESPONSE PREVENTION
IN RATS
47
analysis of variance by ranks (Siegel, 1956) was applied to each of three learning measures, data substantiated there were no significant acquisition effects. In general the acquisition previous findings that learning was extremely rapid using this automated apparatus and procedure. As seen in Table 1, there was a significant effect of the response-prevention treatments upon the number of responses made during extinction. Group MF made significantly or Group RP (V=58.5, p
48
ISRAEL
LEDERHENDLER and MORRIE
BAUM
REFERENCES BAUM M. (1965) An automated apparatus for the avoidance training of rats. Psychof. Rep. IS, 1205-1211. BAUM M. (1966) Rapid extinction of an avoidance response following a period of response prevention in the avoidance apparatus. Psychol. Rep. 18, 59-64. BAIJM M. (1968) Efficacy of response prevention (flooding) in facilitating the extinction of an avoidance response in rats: The effect of overtraining the response. Behav. Res. & Therapy 6, 197-203. BAUM M. (1969a) Extinction of an avoidance response following response prevention: Some parametric investigations. Can. J. Psychol. 23, l-10. BALJMM. (1969b) Extinction of an avoidance response motivated by intense fear: Social facilitation of the action of response prevention (flooding) in rats. Behav. Res. & Therapy 7, 57-62. HOGAN R. A. and KIRCHNERJ. H. (1967) Preliminary report of the extinction of learned fears via shortterm implosive therapy. J. abnorm. Psycho/. 72, 106-109. PAGE H. A. (1955) The facilitation of experimental extinction by response prevention as a function of the acquisition of a new response. J. camp. physiol. Psychol. 48, 14-16. POLIN A. T. (1959) The effect of flooding and physical suppression as extinction techniques on an anxietymotivated avoidance locomotor response. J. Psychof. 47, 253-255. SIEGEL S. (1956) Nonparametric Statistics for the Behavioral Sciences. McGraw-Hill, New York. STAMPFLT. G. (1967) Implosive therapy: The theory. In Behaviour Modificafion Techniques in the Treatmenf of Emotional Disorders (Ed. S. G. AFCMTAGE).Veterans Administration Publication, Battle Creek, Mich. WEINBERGERN. M. (1965) Effect of detainment on extinction of avoidance responses. J. camp. physiol. Psychol. 60, 135-138. WOLPE J. (1958) Psychotherapy by Reciprocal Inhibition. Stanford University Press, Stanford.