From Greg Williams (930412 - 2)
Installment II re. Norman R.F. Maier, FRUSTRATION, 1949. See my post
titled "Maier I" for information on the experimental set-up and some
definitions.
Data presented by Maier can be examined at three levels of detail.
His book begins qualitative summaries of the findings, then presents
some quantitative information on specific runs, with more numerical
statistical analysis in individual research papers on which the book
is based. I'll start with the qualitative summaries.
27 - "After a short while in the insoluble problem situation and with
pressure applied to force behavior, the animal develops a response to
the situation that has no adaptive value in the sense thyat it is
adequate to the situation or in the sense that it is superior to any
number of other possible responses. Nevertheless, the appearance of
the behavior is associated with a decline in resistance to jumping.
Thus an animal that is forced to respond in the insoluble problem
situation may always choose the card on right, despite the fact that
this choice is punished on half the trials. This type of response is
not selected by the method with which reward and punishment are used.
At the same time it is not a mere random response but is consistently
expressed and so must be considered as a response to the situation.
To distinguish this response from the position-reward responses we
shall hereafter refer to it as a POSITION STEREOTYPE. SYMBOL
STEREOTYPES may also appear under these conditions. To the casual
observer position and symbol stereotypes have the same appearance as
position- and symbol-reward responses."
28-30 - "In most rats the response to the insoluble problem [with
pressure applied] is a position stereotype. More than 80 per cent of
the rats eventually settle on a right or left position stereotype and
the remainder ordinarily form a symbol stereotype. If efforts were not
made to prevent them, abortive responses [footnote: "The abortive
responses... observed include (a) jumping above the cards so that all
four feet of the animal strike the screen; (b) jumping to the extreme
right or left of the card; (c) jumping at a card and striking it with
the side of the body; and (d) jumping to the ledge of the screen just
below the card and grasping the ledge with the fore paws. The abortive
responses have been reduced bvy placing screens above the cards,
having the animal jump from a box rather than a platform, and
retraining animals with unlatched windows when they fail to jump at
the cards."] might occur with considerable frequency.... These
abortive responses also have the characteristics of stereotyped
behavior and may be called ABORTIVE STEREOTYPES. Our present method
eliminates the majority of these responses, however, so that this type
of response is kept at a minimum.
The stereotyped respnses developed in the no-solution problem
situation [with pressure applied] are highly specific in nature. The
stereotype adopted by any given animal will be repeated without
variation for at least several hundred trials, without the animal's
once attempting an alternative, despite the fact that the response is
punished half the time in the no-solution problem... Punishment if
given on every trial likewise causes no deviation in the stereotyped
response expressed.
To illustrate the loss in behavior variability that accompanies the
frustrating situation, one part of a study by Maier and Klee... may be
cited. A group of 60 rats had been put through various experiences to
establish position- and symbol-reward responses as well as position
and symbol stereotypes. All animals were then trained to form either a
symbol-reward or a position-reward response, the character of which
was different from the first response. Thus all animals were alike in
that each had a rewarded response as a second response, but they
differed in that part of them had stereotypes as their first responses
and part had rewarded responses as their initial responses. After the
second response was learned, all rats were treated alike in that the
second response that had previously been rewarded was now punished on
half the trials....
During the 160 trials (10 trials per day) in this situation, 54 rats
persisted in the second response that they had been trained to make,
despite the fact that the reward aspect had been changed. Not only did
these rats fail to alter their response, but 47 of them never made a
single deviation in 160 trials. The remaining 7 rats made one
deviation each in 160 trials.
Of the 6 animals that abandoned their response, 2 showed a period of
variation, which is what one typically expects if the reward is
withheld. The other 4 rats developed stereotypes; in 2 cases the
stereotype corresponded with the first response developed and in 2
cases the stereotypes were new....
Thus the typical behavior in the no-solution problem situation is a
loss in variability and a tendency to execute some response
repeatedly. When the animal enters the situation with a response, this
response is the one that is likely to be maintained. In other words,
the reward response becomes transformed into a stereotype and the
reward ceases to have its effect in determining the choice made.
However, not all reward responses have the same value in becoming
stereotypes. Of the 60 animals, 31 had position-reward responses and
all were maintained. The other 29 had symbol-reward responses and only
23 of them were maintained. In 4 cases the symbol-reward responses
were replaced by a stereotype that differed from the reward response,
and the two remaining animals showed variability, one during the whole
experiment and one for a period of 30 trials.
Lack of variability in behavior in insoluble problems is not
confined to the type of choice made, however. Even the manner of
jumping and types of escape behavior become highly specific. In one
instance an animal escaped from the jumping platform by jumping out of
the right side of the jumping box to the floor. Platforms were then
built so that the animal landed on an electric grill when it jumped to
the right. The animal persisted in the same type of escape, however,
never once attempting escape to the left.
In general, the type of response made, the manner of execution, and
the type of abortive behavior that may appear under conditions of
frustration show lack of variation and a degree of stereotypy that
perhaps exceeds in specificity the execution of responses developed or
maintained under ordinary learning conditions where reward is given in
connection with response. This occurs despite the fact that there is
nothing in the punishing situation that demands or encourages highly
specific behavior."
I welcome comments, especially in light of previous predictions by
some netters regarding what the rats might do in the situation
outlined above. I urge caution in additional predictions aloing the
lines of "the rats become crazy/catatonic," because, as will be seen
in my next installment, the plot thickens considerably. One might even
say it rigidifies -- but only along certain dimensions, NOT others.
As ever,
Greg