The purpose of the present experiment was to investigate the effect of drive level upon digging behavior during acquisition and extinction.
METHOD. The apparatus was a modified Stone's sand-tube obstruction apparatus which is shown in Fig. 1 (see Text).
The subjects were 38 male albino rats, 90 to 120 days old at the beginning of preliminary observation.
On the first day each subject was placed in the observation box (C) with the tube full of sand for 10 min.under 12 hr. of food deprivation. On the second day subjects were observed under 24 hr. of deprivation.
Experiment 1. Thirty subjects were given 22 trials with empty tube and allowed to eat food for 2 min. in the food box (A). They were run 3 trials a day under a randomized schedule of three deprivation conditions (12, 24 and 36 hr.). After 8 days the mouth of tube was filled with sand. The subjects were divided into 4 groups and tested under 1, 12, 24 and 36 hr. of deprivation.
Experiment 2. Ten subjects used in the first experiment and 8 new subjects trained to remove sand were given 3 trials per day under 24 hr. of deprivation. After 7 days or 20 trials, they were divided into 4 groups and subjected, to experimental extinction under 1, 12, 24 and 36 hr. of deprivation. In extinction trial sand was poured into the tube endlessly until the subject became to show no response for 10 min.
Two subjects from each group were trained again for 7 days and then assigned to a 16 hr. group and a 20 hr. group. Two groups were subjected to experimental extinction as before.
Other 2 subjects from each group received successive experimental extinction for 10 days one trial per day.
RESULTS. Experiment 1. No difference among 4 groups was found in latency and running time during last 6 trials in the training session. Number of subjects who were able to remove the obstruction and to reach the food box within 15 min. was shown in Table 1. Null hypothesis of no difference among 3 groups (12, 24 and 36 hr.) was rejected (p. <.01). This finding would suggest that high drive at the time of testing might facilitate the formation of “insight reaction”. However, the effect of drive level upon either response latency or digging time was not found. (Table 2).
Experiment 2. Since variances of subjects in digging time and time. needed to reach food box were not homogeneous, the analysis of variance. was not made. However, the x
2 test applied to the variances in weight of sand removed by the subjects supported the homogeneity in variance. The analysis of variance for these data showed no difference among 4 groups. (Table 3)
In extinction experiment, digging time, time to extinction, and weight of sand removed by the, subjects were used as measures of response. Using any one of these measures, significant difference was found between the. groups of lower drive (1 and 12 hr. of deprivation) and that of higher drive. (24 and 36 hr. of deprivation). (Table 4, 5 and, 6. Fig. 2, 3 and 4)
During repeated extinction trials, groups of lower drive seemed to extinguish more rapidly. (Table 7 and 8)
These results support previous findings that response strength, which is measured as resistance to extinction, increases with increased deprivation time.
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