2012, 9999, 1–18

JOURNAL OF THE EXPERIMENTAL ANALYSIS OF BEHAVIOR

NUMBER

9999 (XXX)

RELATIONAL COHERENCE IN AMBIGUOUS AND UNAMBIGUOUS RELATIONAL NETWORKS JENNIFER L. QUINONES

AND

STEVEN C. HAYES

UNIVERSITY OF NEVADA, RENO

Clinical theories often appeal to general cognitive styles in explaining psychopathology, but without describing in detail how the patterns are formed. In the present investigation, two experiments were conducted to examine how individuals respond to ambiguous relational networks. In both experiments, the participants learned two 3-stimulus networks (A1 LESS THAN B1, A1 GREATER THAN C1 and A2 GREATER THAN B2, C2 LESS THAN A2). Participants were presented with test trials to examine if they classified the combinatorial relations (B1 $ C1 and B2 $ C2) as SAME or DIFFERENT and as GREATER THAN or LESS THAN. Although the B–C combinatorial relation in Network 1 is derivable in a readily coherent way (B1 GREATER THAN C1 and thus also B1 DIFFERENT C1), in Network 2 the combinatorial relation is ambiguous. When participants were required to specify the Network 2 B–C relation as either SAME or DIFFERENT, those who chose DIFFERENT, also consistently chose B2 as either GREATER THAN or LESS THAN C2. Conversely, those who classified the B–C relation as SAME were inconsistent within themselves in choosing B2 as GREATER THAN or LESS THAN C2. In Experiment 2, nonarbitrary multiple exemplar pretraining was used to bias SAME versus DIFFERENT as a response for ambiguous combinatorial relations. In accord with the pattern seen in Experiment 1, those biased toward DIFFERENT consistently chose a comparative relation between B2 and C2 while those biased toward SAME were inconsistent in their comparative choices. The findings provide support for the importance of history and coherence in establishing patterns of responding to ambiguous relational networks, providing a beginning behavioral model of cognitive styles and errors. Key words: Relational Frame Theory, derived stimulus relations, ambiguous relational networks, unambiguous relational networks, cognitive styles, cognitive errors

Many clinically and practically important situations appear to be characterized by patterns of thinking. Clinicians have emphasized their importance under a wide variety of terms, such as personality factors or cognitive styles, schemas, and errors, and have generally given them causal status. For example, Aaron Beck suggests that “The locus of the disorder in the anxiety states is not in the affective system but in the hypervalent cognitive schemas relevant to danger that are continually presenting a view of reality as dangerous and the self as vulnerable” (Beck & Emery, 1985, p. 192). In other words, patients with anxiety problems have a general style of cognitively misinterpreting events as dangerous when they are not—and this kind of thinking style is the core of anxiety disorders. Albert Ellis made a similar claim: “There are a number of very common irrational, unrealistic, grandiose, self-defeating beliefs that people in our culture and in most other cultures have; and when they strongly believe these ideas they

frequently, though not always, produce dysfunctional emotions and behaviors” (1999, p. 72). From a behavioral point of view the idea that there are unhelpful patterns of thinking is unobjectionable, but the key scientific task is to delineate the nature of these patterns precisely, and to understand the history and contexts that give rise both to the patterns themselves and their role in behavioral systems. As with any behavioral phenomenon, only with a functional and contextual understanding in hand can interventions be reliably designed based on the manipulable details of history and context—actions are not psychological “causes” in a behavior analytic approach (Hayes & Brownstein, 1986). Relational Frame Theory (RFT; Hayes, Barnes-Holmes, & Roche, 2001) holds that arbitrarily applicable derived relational responding is the core response feature in verbal behavior and higher cognition (Hayes, Fox, Gifford, Wilson, Barnes-Holmes, & Healy, 2001). Although specific types of “relational framing” are viewed as learned operants, the fact that relational framing can come under arbitrary contextual control, and involves altering the functions of events in relational networks, defines them as evolutionarily more recent forms of behavior (see Hayes & Sanford, this issue).

Address editorial correspondence to: Steven C. Hayes Department of Psychology/298 University of Nevada Reno, NV 89557-0062 Phone: (775) 784-6828 Fax: (775) 784-1126 Email: [email protected] doi: 10.1002/jeab.67

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JENNIFER L. QUINONES AND STEVEN C. HAYES

Relational frame theorists have argued, “.. once established, coherence and sense-making will serve as a continuously available reinforcer for derived relational responding” (Hayes, Fox et al., 2001, p. 48). The gradual, almost acquisition-like derivation of equivalence during blocked testing without feedback (e.g., Devany, Hayes, & Nelson, 1986) suggests that the ability to respond consistently during testing becomes a context for emitting a particular type of derived relational response. When participants are provided with an opportunity during testing to relate two previously unrelated equivalence classes, they do so in idiosyncratic ways, leading to the formation of larger equivalence classes despite the absence of feedback or other external consequences for doing so (Saunders, Saunders, Kirby, & Spradlin, 1988). In so-called “implicit” measures of cognition, brief, immediate relational responses are more likely with stimulus networks that are coherent and elaborated (Barnes-Holmes, Barnes-Holmes, Stewart, & Boles, 2010). The purpose of the present study was to begin to apply RFT concepts to the development of cognitive styles or cognitive errors, focusing in particular on how humans derive idiosyncratic or even illogical conclusions from fragmentary or inconsistent information. Consider two simple relational networks: 1) B < A and C > A, and 2) B > A and C > A. The first network is coherent and unambiguous. If the individual has acquired coordination (identity, same or similar), distinction (opposite), and comparison framing (quantitative or qualitative relations such as bigger–smaller, faster–slower), s/ he can derive that B and C are different and that C > B. Functionally speaking, (see DeHouwer, 2011 for a discussion of functional perspectives on cognition), when a subject “derives” this conclusion, it means that when the subject learns to select C > B and B < C s/he will select B < A < C and C > A > B due to his or her history with combinatorial relating. In a functional approach, coherence of this kind is due to reinforced consistencies in response patterns. Once the subject responds in accordance with these transitive relations, when s/he then selects C DIFFERENT B and B DIFFERENT C it is presumed to be because of a history of learning that when one stimulus is greater than or less than another it is also different than that stimulus.

The second network is ambiguous (B < A > C), and based on the information provided, nothing can be said for certain about the relation of B and C. The most logical response if forced to specify whether B and C are the same or different is to respond randomly, but history may bias individuals in one direction or another, and once a relational response is made, coherence may dictate that others should follow in accord with that response. For example, if B and C are said to be the same then B cannot be bigger than C or vice versa, but if they are different (and only comparative relations are at issue) then one should be bigger than the other. Functionally speaking, when a subject responds “coherently”, s/he selects a stimulus during one condition (or in one situation) that fits with the pattern of selection of a stimulus during a different but related condition. For example, when a subject selects GREATER THAN when identifying the relation between stimuli A and B, he will later select DIFFERENT when identifying this relation given only the descriptions DIFFERENT or SAME. This approach puts coherence in the reinforced and contextually situated patterns of mutual and combinatorial relational responding, not in the minds of the subjects. This situation is not unlike clinical situations in which the rational thing to do when presented with ambiguous information is to withhold judgment, but once that barrier is passed, coherence will tend to draw specific instances into habitual cognitive patterns. For example, a paranoid person unable to catch a bus as it leaves the bus stop could conclude that there is not enough information to know what happened, or that the bus driver did not see him, or that the driver saw him and could not stop, or that the driver saw him and chose not to stop. Once that choice is made (e.g., the driver chose not to stop), coherence will tend to reinforce larger relational patterns (e.g., because he resents my great success; because he wants to hurt me; because the FBI told him not to do so). The current investigation was intended in Experiment 1 to detect patterns in how participants disambiguate ambiguous relations in a situation that could be influenced by the coherence of GREATER THAN/LESS THAN and SAME/DIFFERENT framing. In Experiment 2, a key aspect of these patterns was modified experimentally through multiple

AMBIGUOUS STIMULUS NETWORKS exemplar training intended to establish a history that would bias participants’ responding when presented with ambiguous relational networks. A similar approach was used by Wulfert, Dougher and Greenway (1991) to bias subjects’ responding either toward labeling stimulus compounds or the relations among stimuli during matching-to-sample equivalence training. During Experiment 1 of their study, subjects who formed stimulus equivalence labeled the relations among the stimuli while those who did not derive equivalence labeled stimulus compounds. In Experiment 2, the authors found that a pretraining history of describing the stimulus compounds interfered with the emergence of stimulus equivalence, as compared with describing the relations among stimuli. In the current investigation, the effect of a biasing process on the coherence of a larger pattern of resulting derived relations was similarly examined. EXPERIMENT 1 Method Participants Adult participants were recruited via a posting at a local university and were paid $20.00 to $30.00 by earning points during the experiment, which lasted 2–3 hrs. Four male participants completed the experiment. Two additional participants (one female and one male) participated but withdrew, seemingly due to difficulties in earning money due to the complexity of the learning task. Setting and Apparatus All sessions were conducted in a small room containing a table, a laptop computer with a 1500 monitor and two chairs. The participants sat at the computer and instructions appeared on the screen indicating what they should do. The experiment was programmed in VisualBasic.Net1. Procedure The participants were asked to sit in front of the computer and press the keys indicated while paying attention to the computer screen. Participants earned one point (worth 5 cents) for each correct answer and lost one point (which did not lead to money loss, only the loss of points) for each incorrect answer during all

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phases except for test periods, which did not have associated points. Relational networks. Participants were trained in two different one node three-stimuli networks in the presence of comparative relational cues which will here be designated using the symbol > (GREATER THAN) or < (LESS THAN; see Fig. 1 and Table 1). The first network (termed here the Unambiguous Network) consisted of training A1 < B1 and A1 > C1 while the second (the Ambiguous Network) consisted of training A2 > B2 and C2 < A2. Tests of combinatorially entailed relations (i.e., a derived stimulus relation whereby two or more stimulus relations combine in a mutual way, generic for “transitivity” and “equivalence” in the stimulus equivalence literature) were the key focus of Experiment 1. Both networks yielded coherent mutually entailed relations and the Unambiguous Network did so with combinatorially entailed relations (B1 > C1 and C1 < B1) but the combinatorially entailed relations in the Ambiguous Network (B2 ! C2 and C2 ! B2) are not derivable based on the information provided from the trained relations. Experimental conditions. The precursor to the Relational Evaluation Procedure or pREP procedure (Cullinan, Barnes, & Smeets, 1998; Cullinan, Barnes-Holmes, & Smeets, 2000, 2001) was used to teach participants the cues for relational responses (Steele & Hayes, 1991) followed by training in the relational network itself. Experiment 1 also included a Pavlovian conditioning phase following the pREP (see Quinones, 2008), and pre- and post-tests for transformation of function were conducted using the Extrinsic Affective Simon Task (EAST) (DeHouwer, 2003); however, these additional experimental conditions are not relevant here and will not be presented. Phase 1: Training relational cues. In the first phase, participants were taught to select an arbitrary contextual stimulus that corresponded to the relation between a sequentially presented pair of stimuli (e.g., SAME). Participants were presented with the following instruction on the computer screen prior to beginning the phase: During this part of the experiment, an object will appear in the center of the screen for one second, the screen will go blank for one second, and then another object will appear for one second. Pay attention to these objects very carefully! Then, two symbols will appear

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JENNIFER L. QUINONES AND STEVEN C. HAYES

Fig. 1. Unambiguous (1) and ambiguous (2) relational networks for Experiments 1 and 2. Trained (solid lines) and tested (dotted lines) relations are indicated with arrows; the relations trained (greater than or less than) and the entailed emergent relations are given by the mathematical symbols (e.g., A1 < B1 in the upper network). Question marks are given when the entailed relations are ambiguous.

Table 1 Overall Patterns of Responding for Experiments 1 and 2 High Probability of Selection Given Specified Trained Relations and Specified Crel Cues TO FROM

A1 B1 A1 T< B1 M> C1 M< C< High Probability of Selection Given Unspecified Trained Relations and Specified Crel Cues

C1 T> C>

TO A2 FROM

A2 B2 C2

M< T


C2 M> U

U

Note. Relations are specified “FROM” A, B, or C “TO” A, B, or C. Shaded cells are relations which are not applicable (e.g., FROM A1 to A1). Relations: T ¼ trained; M ¼ derived mutual entailment; C ¼ derived combinatorial entailment; Crel Cues: > ¼ greater than, < ¼ less than; U ¼ unspecified relation. For example, in the Unambiguous Network, A1 was trained as LESS THAN B1 and GREATER THAN C1. The derived mutually entailed relations included B1 GREATER THAN A1 and C1 LESS THAN A1. The derived combinatorial entailed relations included B1 GREATER THAN C1 and C1 LESS THAN B1.

AMBIGUOUS STIMULUS NETWORKS across the bottom of the screen. I want you to look very carefully at these symbols and then pick one. To pick the symbol on the left, press the “Z” key, to pick the symbol on the right, press the “M” key. Press the “Enter” key when you are ready. 1 point is given for correct answers and 1 point is removed for incorrect answers. You will receive $.05 for every point. Good luck! Get money! Trials began by presenting for 1 s a white-onblack sample stimulus (e.g., a line), a 1-s blank screen, and then the comparison stimulus (e.g., the same line) for 1 s. The screen again went blank for 1 s before two arbitrary contextual stimuli appeared at the left and right bottom corners of the screen. The arbitrary contextual stimuli were !!!!!,  , #####, and $$$$$, and they corresponded to relations of SAME, DIFFERENT, GREATER THAN, and LESS THAN, respectively (the left/right positions of the stimuli were counterbalanced across trials). Participants were required to press the Z (left contextual stimulus) or M (right stimulus) key on a standard QWERTY keyboard to make their selection. Once the participant responded, the stimuli disappeared. There was no time limit to respond (cf., Cullinan et al., 1998, 2000). If the response was correct, a “ding” sound was presented for 1 s, a message appeared on the screen (“Right!”) for 3 s, and one point was added to the counter. If the response was incorrect, then a “buzzer” sound was presented (for 1 s), a message appeared on the screen (“Wrong!”) for 3 s, and one point was removed from the running total. The running total for the block of trials was displayed on the top of the screen until the next trial began. Adjacent pairs of stimuli in Table 2 were used on trials in which the relation between the stimuli was GREATER THAN or LESS THAN; adjacent pairs of stimuli in Table 3 were used on trials in which the relation between the stimuli was SAME or DIFFERENT. For a given stimulus set (a pair of related stimuli) used in SAME/ DIFFERENT training, there were four possible stimulus sequences (e.g., if the stimulus set was a line and a dot, the four possibilities were line/ line, line/dot, dot/dot, and dot/line) combined with two possible left/right arrangements of the SAME/DIFFERENT cues, resulting in eight trial types that were randomized for that set. For each stimulus set in the GREATER

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THAN/LESS THAN training, two possible stimulus sequences (e.g., if the stimulus set was a dot and six dots, the two possibilities were six dots/one dot, one dot/six dots) were combined with two possible left/right arrangements of the GREATER THAN/LESS THAN cues, resulting in four trial types that were randomized. In order to balance these two types of training, each training block contained three sets of sample and comparison stimuli for teaching SAME and DIFFERENT cues and six sets for teaching GREATER THAN and LESS THAN cues for a total of nine sets. This difference in the number of stimulus sets was needed because SAME/DIFFERENT sets had eight trial types (thus three sets yielded 24 possible presentations) and GREATER THAN/LESS THAN sets had four trial types (thus six sets were needed to yield 24 possible presentations). Combining all of these trial types resulted in a balanced 48-trial block that covered both types of training. The 48-trial training block was presented repeatedly with feedback until the participant made no errors within an entire training block. A 48-trial generalization block with novel stimuli (9 novel stimulus sets: 3 for SAME/DIFFERENT and 6 for GREATER THAN/LESS THAN) was then presented without feedback. If any errors were made in the generalization block, the previous training block was retrained, and the same generalization block was then repeated. If a generalization block was failed three times, a new 48-trial block composed of novel stimulus sets was trained followed by a new 48-trial generalization block. This pattern continued until the training criterion was reached: no errors in an entire 48-trial generalization block. When the training criterion was reached, the participant advanced to Phase 2. Phase 2: Training and testing arbitrary stimulus networks. During this phase, two relations between three-letter nonsense syllables were trained per network (see solid arrows in Fig. 1). The computer program randomly picked the set of nonsense syllables from a list so that the stimulus set varied from participant to participant. Participants were presented with the following instructions prior to beginning the phase: During this part of the experiment, one threeletter nonsense syllable (e.g., JOF) will appear in the center of the screen for one second, the

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JENNIFER L. QUINONES AND STEVEN C. HAYES Table 2 Stimuli Used in Phase 3 for Teaching GREATER THAN/LESS THAN in Each Experiment

Note. Each stimulus was presented in white on a black background. Adjacent pairs in each row were used as stimulus sets.

screen will go blank for one second, then another nonsense syllable will appear for one second (e.g., GIB). Then, two symbols will appear across the bottom of the screen. These will be the same symbols from the previous phase. Look at each of the symbols closely and pick one - only one will be right. To pick the symbol on the left, press the “Z” key, to pick the symbol on the right, press the “M” key. Now, sometimes you will receive feedback regarding your performance and sometimes you will not (sometimes a test will occur). This phase will

take MUCH longer than the previous phase. So, please feel free to take a break at any time during this phase. Press the “Enter” key when you are ready. Good luck! Get money! The same training sequence as in the previous phase was used here. That is, in each trial, a sample stimulus (e.g., ZUF) was followed by a network-consistent (e.g., LER) or inconsistent (e.g., JUK) comparison stimulus and then the arbitrary contextual stimuli (e.g., ##### for GREATER THAN, $$$$$ for LESS THAN)

AMBIGUOUS STIMULUS NETWORKS

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Table 3 Stimuli Used in Phase 3 for Teaching SAME/DIFFERENT in Each Experiment

Note. Each stimulus was presented in white on a black background. Each row shows three adjacent pairs that were used as stimulus sets.

appeared. The same contingent consequences occurred as described in Phase 1. Participants were first required to master a set of primer trials in which the mutually entailed relation was directly trained through multiple exemplars. The combinatorial relation was tested without feedback before moving on to a new set of nonsense syllables in which both mutual and combinatorial relations were tested without feedback. In the Unambiguous Network (B1 > A1 > C1), primer trials trained the selection of the GREATER THAN or LESS THAN arbitrary contextual stimuli with the following sample (first stimulus) and comparison stimuli: A1 < B1, B1 > A1, A1 > C1, C1 < A1 (note that the >/< stimuli were not presented, they represent the correct response). The four primer trials in the Ambiguous Network (B2 < A2 > C2) were: A2 > B2, B2 < A2, A2 > C2, C2 < A2. These eight trials were randomly presented four times for a total of 32 trials per training block. Interspersed were probe blocks of 16 trials each (4 from each network each presented two times). The procedures of the probe trials were the same as the training trials except feedback was not provided.

Upon mastery of these trained relations (100% correct) tests of the combinatorial relations were conducted without feedback. For the Unambiguous Network these four relations were B1 > C1, C1 < B1, B1 DIFFERENT C1, C1 DIFFERENT B1. In the Ambiguous Network, test trials of the combinatorial relation between the sample and comparison were ambiguous (i.e., there was no correct or incorrect answer given the ambiguous network training). The four tested sequences for this network presented B2 ! C2 or C2 ! B2 with GREATER THAN/LESS THAN or SAME/ DIFFERENT arbitrary contextual relational stimuli. Participants were required to achieve >80% accuracy on the GREATER THAN/LESS THAN combinatorial entailment relations of the Unambiguous Network in order to advance to a novel set of nonsense syllables. Following mastery of the primer trials, and following the introduction of new nonsense syllables, participants were trained to relate A1 < B1 and A1 > C1 in the Unambiguous Network, and A2 > B2 and C2 > A2 in the Ambiguous Network; the combinatorial relations were no longer trained. These 4 trials were randomly presented eight times for a total of 32

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JENNIFER L. QUINONES AND STEVEN C. HAYES Ambiguous Network. Participants 1 and 4 classified the ambiguous combinatorial relations in that network (B2 $ C2) as SAME (S in Table 4), while Participants 2 and 3 classified them as DIFFERENT. Participant 1 picked the response GREATER THAN for all of the GREATER THAN/LESS THAN probe trials, regardless of which stimulus (B2 or C2) was presented as the sample stimulus. Participant 4 responded inconsistently, classifying B2 < C2 on 62.5% of opportunities and C2 > B2 on 37.5% of the opportunities. This inconsistency makes sense since, if these stimuli are considered to be SAME, then they cannot be classified consistently as GREATER THAN/LESS THAN. The two participants who classified the ambiguous relation as DIFFERENT did pick one stimulus as GREATER THAN the other (with the reverse relation consistently classified).

trials (this made up one block of training trials) until 80% correct was achieved. The eight relations that were tested were: B1 ! A1; C1 ! A1; B1 ! C1; C1 ! B1; B2 ! A2; A2 ! C2; B2 ! C2; C2 ! B2. The four mutually entailed relations were paired with GREATER THAN/LESS THAN contextual relational stimuli while each of the four combinatorial relations were paired with one of two sets of contextual relational stimuli (GREATER THAN/LESS THAN or SAME/DIFFERENT), totaling 12 possible probe trials. Blocks of 32 training trials were interspersed with blocks of 24 probe trials (12 probe trials presented twice). Participants were required to obtain 80% accuracy on the mutual entailment relations of both the Ambiguous and Unambiguous networks and the GREATER THAN/LESS THAN combinatorial relation of the Unambiguous Network in order to meet mastery criteria for the experiment. Results Table 4 shows the average percentage correct (over all the probes) for the mutual and combinatorial entailment relations and the number of stimulus sets required to achieve mastery of the derived relations for Participants 1- 4. All four participants correctly classified the GREATER THAN/LESS THAN mutual and combinatorial relations of the Unambiguous Network. Although not part of the mastery criterion in the Unambiguous Network, participants also correctly identified B1 and C1 to be DIFFERENT (on SAME/DIFFERENT trials) at least 81% of the time. A key focus of Experiment 1 was the pattern of responding to combinatorial relations in the

Discussion Experiment 1 showed that participants tend to derive coherent relations when presented with an unambiguous network. When participants were trained on an unambiguous GREATER THAN/LESS THAN network (A1< B1, A1 > C1) they classified the combinatorial relation as DIFFERENT. This fits, since one stimulus is greater than the other (B1 > C1). The participants who classified the ambiguous B2 $ C2 relation as SAME, did not consistently choose one stimulus as greater than the other, but those participants who classified this relation as DIFFERENT did consistently choose one stimulus as greater than the other. Participant 2 classified B2 > C2 (and therefore C2 < B2) while Participant 3 classified the relation in the opposite direction (C2 > B2; B2 < C2).

Table 4 Average percentage correct and number of probe stimulus sets required for mastery of mutual and combinatorial relations for Participants 1–4 for Experiment 1 Mutual Entailment Participant 1 2 3 4

Combinatorial Entailment

B1 > A1 C1 < A1

B2 < A2 A2 >C2

B1 > C1 C1 < B1

B1 D C1 C1 D B1

B2-C2 as S or D

B2-C2 as > or
B2 > C2; C2 < B2 (88) C2 > B2; B2 < C2 (100) Inconsistent

4 4 6 4

Note. Greater than ¼ > , less than ¼ < , D ¼ different, S ¼ same, No. ¼ number. Number listed in each cell denotes the percentage of trials (averaged from the total number of probe sets) in which the participant selected the response indicated in the corresponding column heading. Any relation (e.g., C2 > B2; B2 < C2) indicated will be paired with a number which denotes the percentage of trials that participant selected that relation. Participant 4 was inconsistent in his/her responding on these trials.

AMBIGUOUS STIMULUS NETWORKS A variety of explanations for these differences are possible. The differences could have been due to the alphabetical order of the nonsense syllables. For Participant 2, B2 was ZUD and C2 was VEK while for Participant 3, these stimuli were VEK (B2) and ZAS (C2). These participants may therefore have inferred that a nonsense syllable that followed another nonsense syllable alphabetically was GREATER THAN the one that came before. That is, VEK comes before ZUD and therefore is LESS THAN ZUD. Likewise, ZAS comes after VEK and therefore is GREATER THAN VEK. Participants may have classified these relations due to some other rule (e.g., the Unambiguous Network contained a B–C relation of DIFFERENT; therefore, the Ambiguous Network is also DIFFERENT). It would also seem possible that the selection of SAME may be more likely than the selection of DIFFERENT since both B2 and C2 are LESS THAN A2. That they share this property may lead one to conclude they are more similar than different. It is also possible that the participants selected one response over another simply due to their experimental history of learning conditional relations which led to consistent unreinforced conditional selections (Saunders et al., 1988). Finally, selection preferences may have been due to idiosyncratic histories participants brought with them to the experiment. One way to clarify this would be to arrange specific histories experimentally. An experimental analysis would be helpful also in examining the interaction between coordination or distinction and comparative relational responding when presented with ambiguous relational networks. Experiment 2 deliberately manipulated the tendency to characterize ambiguous combinatorial GREATER THAN/LESS THAN relations as SAME or DIFFERENT through the use of multiple exemplar training with words for common objects. Responding to novel ambiguous relations among arbitrary stimuli was then examined. EXPERIMENT 2 Methods Participants, Setting, and Apparatus Participants were recruited and paid similarly to Experiment 1, except that four participants were recruited through personal contacts. Twenty-eight participants were randomly assigned to four experimental conditions. Eight participants

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withdrew from the study before completion, seemingly due to difficulties in learning the task. This left 20 adult participants in total (12 males and 8 females) with six assigned to Conditions 1 and 2, and four assigned to Conditions 3 and 4. Participants attended one session of 2–4 hrs in length and earned $20.00 to $45.00 by earning points during the experiment. The same experimental arrangement was used as in Experiment 1. Procedure The same basic procedures and relational networks were used as in Experiment 1. Experimental sequence and conditions. Participants were randomly assigned to one of four conditions. Condition 1. The first condition was identical to Experiment 1 (with the exception that the instructions for Phase 2 informed the participants that the alphabetical order of the nonsense syllables was not important). Condition 2. The second condition was identical to Experiment 1 but did not include Phase 1 such that the pretraining of relational cues did not occur. Consequently, the response options remained ambiguous. This phase was included as a control to demonstrate that the training of relational stimuli was necessary. Condition 3. These participants were presented with Phase 1 pretraining as in Experiment 1. After meeting mastery criteria for the relational cues, participants were then presented with additional training to bias their responding toward SAME in an ambiguous relational network. Following this training, they continued on to Phase 2 as in Experiment 1. More specifically, after learning the relational cues in Phase 1, participants were exposed to pREP format training using known English terms (see Table 5) that were anticipated to lead to the selection of SAME when given two trained GREATER THAN/LESS THAN relations in an otherwise ambiguous network. The relationships were hierarchical in nature such that the terms used for the B and C stimuli were members belonging to a broader category (A). The use of a hierarchical structure allowed for the GREATER THAN/LESS THAN relations to be used while simultaneously classifying the relations as the SAME. For example, one stimulus set was: ANIMAL> BEAR; DOG < ANIMAL; therefore BEAR SAME DOG. Both DOG and BEAR are members of the broader

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JENNIFER L. QUINONES AND STEVEN C. HAYES Table 5 Stimuli Used During SAME Bias Group for GREATER THAN/LESS THAN for Experiment 2

Set

A

B

C

1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20

clothing fruit furniture plant animal transportation toys community helpers vegetables people alphabet instruments colors numbers shapes library Earth insects reptiles birds

shirt pineapple table tree dog train ball nurse carrot man m piano red 3 circle book Africa butterfly snake eagle

pants mango chair flower bear car puzzle firefighter broccoli woman q cello blue 7 square microfilm Japan ladybug iguana parrot

category ANIMAL and as such each is, in this way, LESS THAN the category to which they belong, ANIMAL. However, since they both belong to this category, in this way, they are the SAME. In order to insure that reinforcement was equal for SAME and DIFFERENT, participants also were given SAME/DIFFERENT trials (see Table 6) and trained to choose DIFFERENT (e.g., FLOWER DIFFERENT ROCKS; ROCKS SAME MOUNTAIN; therefore FLOWER DIFFERENT MOUNTAIN). Four sets of words were taught at a time, two from the GREATER THAN/LESS THAN list (Table 5) and two from the SAME/DIFFERENT list (Table 6). A set included the A, B, and C words (e.g., Set 1 of Table 5: CLOTHING, SHIRT, PANTS). Participants were explicitly trained on mutual and combinatorial relations for the first four sets of words before being presented with four novel sets in which derived relations were not trained. For example, one set of training trials to teach selecting SAME in a GREATER THAN/LESS THAN Ambiguous Network was: CLOTHING > SHIRT, CLOTHING > PANTS, SHIRT < CLOTHING, PANTS < CLOTHING; SHIRT SAME PANTS, PANTS SAME SHIRT. Explicit training would also occur on a set from Table 6 to balance trials for the

selection of DIFFERENT: FLOWER DIFFERENT ROCKS, ROCKS DIFFERENT FLOWER, ROCKS SAME MOUNTAIN, MOUNTAIN SAME ROCKS, FLOWER DIFFERENT MOUNTAIN, MOUNTAIN DIFFERENT FLOWER. During multiple exemplar training, the trained sequences for the GREATER THAN/ LESS THAN trials were the same as those in the primer training trials of Phase 2 of Experiment 1 for the Ambiguous Network with the exception of explicitly training the relation of SAME between B and C (A2 > B2, B2 < A2; C2 < A2, A2 >C2; B2 SAME C2 and C2 SAME B2). The trained sequences for the SAME/DIFFERENT trials were: A2 DIFFERENT B2, B2 DIFFERENT A2, A2 SAME C2, C2 SAME A2, B2 DIFFERENT C2, and C2 DIFFERENT B2. As in Phase 2 of Experiment 1, the order of the training trials was: A ! B and C ! A instead of A ! B and A ! C so that reinforcement for both GREATER THAN and LESS THAN was possible. The six GREATER THAN/LESS THAN and the six SAME/DIFFERENT training trials were each presented twice (once for each set of words) so that each trial block consisted of 24 trials. Once participants met a mastery criterion (defined as 90% correct), they were presented with four novel sets of words, trained on the

Table 6 Stimuli Used During SAME Bias Group for SAME/DIFFERENT for Experiment 2 Set

A

B

C

1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20

rocks glass couch house car phone plant cucumber plate table 1 triangle red dog fork water hamburger violin bingo man

flower dog bear bird fish cat boat banana cake socks blue 10 a bowl circle dirt piano 9 hotel stove

mountain cup chair hut bus computer tree broccoli spoon bed 5 square green cat knife coffee french fries trumpet poker woman

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AMBIGUOUS STIMULUS NETWORKS relations: A2 ! B2 and C2 ! A2 and then tested for generalization of the derived relations: B2 ! A2, A2 ! C2, B2 ! C2, and C2 ! B2. The trained relations for the GREATER THAN/LESS THAN trials were A2 > B2 and C2 < A2. The tested relations for these trials were B2 < A2, A2 > C2, B2 SAME C2, C2 SAME B2. The trained relations for the SAME/ DIFFERENT trials were A2 DIFFERENT B2 and C2 SAME A2. The tested relations for these trials were B2 DIFFERENT A2, A2 SAME C2, B2 DIFFERENT C2, and C2 DIFFERENT B2. The four trained relations were presented twice (once for each set of words) making 8 trials. These 8 trials were repeated three times for a total of 24 trials per training block. Training blocks were interspersed with probe blocks of 32 trials each in which each test sequence (for mutual and combinatorial entailment for each set of words) was presented twice. Once one block of probe trials was mastered (defined as 90% correct), the participant advanced to Phase 2 as in Experiment 1. If the participant failed the first generalization set, another set of four training words was introduced and all relations were trained again using multiple exemplars, followed again by a generalization set. No participants required more than two generalization sets to meet mastery criterion. Condition 4. These participants also completed Phase 1 of Experiment 1 but were then presented with additional training to bias their responding toward DIFFERENT prior to entering Phase 2. More specifically, participants experienced the same sequence of training and testing as those in Condition 3 except that the English language stimulus sets were constructed so as to enable the selection of DIFFERENT when given an ambiguous stimulus network. For example, one stimulus set was 1000 > 25; 500 < 1000; therefore 25 DIFFERENT 500. Trials were balanced for reinforcement using SAME/DIFFERENT trials as in Condition 3. Two different sets of trials were required, one SAME/ SAME (e.g., PINEAPPLE SAME FRUIT; MANGO SAME FRUIT; therefore PINEAPPLE SAME MANGO—they belong to the same class) and one DIFFERENT/DIFFERENT (e.g., FLOWER DIFFERENT ROCKS; WORM DIFFERENT ROCKS; therefore FLOWER SAME WORM— both are alive). Using SAME/SAME and DIFFERENT/DIFFERENT trials was required since

it is incoherent to suggest that A SAME B; A DIFFERENT C; therefore B SAME C. Four sets of words were taught at a time, two from the GREATER THAN/LESS THAN list (Table 7) and two from the SAME/DIFFERENT list (one from the SAME set and one from the DIFFERENT set; Table 8). Participants were first taught all relations (A2 ! B2, B2 ! A2, A2 ! C2, C2 ! A2, B2 ! C2, C2 ! B2) through multiple exemplar training. The trained sequences for the GREATER THAN/LESS THAN trials were the same as those in Condition 3 except the B–C relations were trained to bias toward DIFFERENT. The trained sequences on SAME/SAME trials were as above but the correct answer was to select the arbitrary stimulus corresponding to SAME on every trial. The trained sequences for the DIFFERENT/ DIFFERENT trials were the same as those for the SAME/SAME trials except the correct response was DIFFERENT for the relations: A2 ! B2, B2 ! A2, A2 ! C2, and C2 ! A2 (the correct response was SAME on B2 ! C2 and C2 ! B2 trials). The six GREATER THAN/LESS THAN training trials were each presented twice (once for each set of words). The six SAME/ SAME and the six DIFFERENT/DIFFERENT training trials were each presented once (once Table 7 Stimuli Used During DIFFERENT Bias Group for GREATER THAN/LESS THAN for Experiment 2 Set

A

B

C

1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20

1000 $5.00 31st quarter mile gallon large kilogram ocean adult ship queen pope president 500 6ft. 3 inch. brick house 15th $5.00 125 lbs.

10 20¢ 2nd penny inch quart medium gram lake baby yacht pawn cardinal vice president 10 5ft. 8 inch. straw house 10th $1.00 100 lbs.

500 5¢ 19th dime foot pint small milligram pond child canoe bishop priest treasurer 25 5ft. 10 inch wood house 3rd $2.00 15 lbs.

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JENNIFER L. QUINONES AND STEVEN C. HAYES Table 8 Stimuli Used During DIFFERENT Bias Group for SAME/DIFFERENT for Experiment 2

SAME Set

A

1 fruit 2 furniture 3 number 4 shape 5 color 6 clothes 7 winter 8 toys 9 candy 10 money DIFFERENT set A 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20

rocks house car cup book hanger bird snake bear circle

B

C

kiwi chair 1 circle purple skirt snowman swing gum 5¢ B

strawberry table 10 square green hat cold jump rope chocolate $1.00 C

flower shoe tree water woman pen dog calf butterfly 2

worm sock plant tea girl pencil bear kitten spider 10

for each set of words). Therefore, each trial block consisted of 24 trials. Once the participant achieved mastery criterion (defined as 90% correct), s/he was presented with four novel sets of words to test for generalization of the derived relations. For example, one set of training trials to teach selecting DIFFERENT in a GREATER THAN/ LESS THAN Ambiguous Network would be: 1000 > 25; 500 < 1000; 25 < 1000; 1000 > 500; 25 DIFFERENT 500; 500 DIFFERENT 25; $5.00 > 5¢; 20¢ < $5.00; 5¢ < $5.00; $5.00 > 20¢; 20¢ DIFFERENT 5¢; 5¢ DIFFERENT 20¢. Explicit training would also occur on a set from Table 8 to balance trials for the selection of SAME: kiwi SAME fruit; fruit SAME strawberry; fruit SAME kiwi; strawberry SAME fruit; kiwi SAME strawberry; strawberry SAME kiwi; shoe DIFFERENT house; house DIFFERENT sock; house DIFFERENT shoe; sock DIFFERENT house; sock SAME shoe; shoe SAME sock. Once the mastery criterion was met, the participant was presented with four novel sets and trained for A2 ! B2 and C2 ! A2 and then tested for generalization of the derived relations: B2 ! A2, A2 ! C2, B2 ! C2 and C2 ! B2. During the generalization component, the

trained sequences for the GREATER THAN/ LESS THAN trials were the same as those in Condition 3 except the participants were expected to select DIFFERENT for the B–C relations. The trained sequences for the SAME/SAME trials were A1 SAME B1 and C1 SAME A1. The tested sequences were B1 SAME A1, A1 SAME C1, B1 SAME C1, and C1 SAME B1. The trained sequences for the DIFFERENT/DIFFERENT trials were A1 DIFFERENT B1 and C1 DIFFERENT A1. The tested sequences were B1 DIFFERENT A1, A1 DIFFERENT C1, B1 SAME C1, and C1 SAME B1. During the generalization component, the six trained relations were presented twice (once for each set of words) making 12 trials. These 12 trials were repeated three times making 36 trials per training block. The six GREATER THAN/ LESS THAN derived trials were presented twice (once for each set of words) and the six SAME/ SAME and the six DIFFERENT/DIFFERENT derived trials were each presented once (for the one set of words). These 24 trials made one trial block. Once the participant achieved mastery criterion (defined as 90% correct), s/he advanced to Phase 2 as in Experiment 1. No participant required more than two generalization sets to achieve the mastery criterion. Results Condition 1. All six of the participants in Condition 1 (see Table 9) identified the mutually and combinatorially entailed GREATER THAN/LESS THAN relations in the Unambiguous Network at 80% and 95% or higher, respectively. When asked to classify the combinatorial relation as SAME/DIFFERENT, all six of the participants classified the B1 $ C1 relation in the Unambiguous Network as DIFFERENT (at 95% or higher), replicating the pattern seen in Experiment 1 with regard to this relation. Four of the six participants in Condition 1 classified the B2 $ C2 relation in the Ambiguous Network as SAME (S in Table 9) while two classified this relation as DIFFERENT. None of the participants who classified the ambiguous combinatorial relation as SAME picked one stimulus as GREATER THAN or LESS THAN the other on a consistent basis. Indeed, Participants 3 and 5 picked GREATER THAN for every probe trial, which is consistent but not logical (B2 > C2 and C2 > B2 cannot both be correct). Participants 1 and 4, who classified this

13

AMBIGUOUS STIMULUS NETWORKS Table 9 Average percentage correct and number of probe stimulus sets required for mastery of mutual and combinatorial relations for Participants 1–6 for Experiment 2: Condition 1 Mutual Entailment Participant 1 2 3 4 5 6

Combinatorial Entailment

B1 > A1 C1 < A1

B2 < A2 A2 > C2

B1 > C1 C1 < B1

B1 D C1 C1 D B1

B2-C2 as S or D

B2-C2 as > or
C2; C2 < B2 (96) Inconsistent All > B2 < C2; C2 > B2 (100) All > Inconsistent

6 5 5 5 5 5

Note. Greater than ¼ > , less than ¼ < , D ¼ different, S ¼ same, No. ¼ number. Number listed in each cell denotes the percentage of trials (averaged from the total number of probe sets) in which the participant selected the response indicated in the corresponding column heading. Any relation (e.g., C2 > B2; B2 < C2) indicated will be paired with a number which denotes the percentage of trials that participant selected that relation. Participants 2 and 6 were inconsistent in selecting one response as GREATER THAN or LESS THAN the other and Participant 5 selected > on all response options.

relation as DIFFERENT did, however, pick one stimulus as greater than the other consistently. All of this closely parallels the findings from Experiment 1. Also as in Experiment 1 alphabetical order may have played a role in determining which stimulus was GREATER THAN/LESS THAN the other (even though participants were specifically told not to attend to that variable). Participant 1 chose B2 > C2 and the nonsense syllables for this participant were POV (B2) and BEX (C2).

Similarly, Participant 4 chose C2 > B2 and this participant’s nonsense syllables were BEX (B2) and FAF (C2). These participants, like Participants 2 and 3 of Experiment 1, may have interpreted alphabetical order along the dimension of GREATER THAN/LESS THAN. Condition 2. Data for the Condition 2 participants who did not receive relational pretraining are shown in Table 10. Four of the six participants did not meet the criterion for mastery of the primer networks (the pREP

Table 10 Average percentage correct and number of probe stimulus sets required for mastery of mutual and combinatorial relations for Participants 7–12 for Experiment 2: Condition 2 Mutual Entailment

Combinatorial Entailment

B1 > A1 C1 < A1

B2 < A2 A2 >C2

B1 > C1 C1 < B1

B1 D C1 C1 D B1

B2-C2 as S or D

B2-C2 as > or
C2; C2 < B2 (100)

8

63 N/A N/A N/A

83 N/A N/A N/A

81 47 50 43

75 S 53 D 50 S 70 D

C2 > B2 (100) B2 < C2 (83) IC IC IC IC

15 P

9 10 11 12

0 C1 > B1; B1 < C1 C1 < B1 (100) B1 < C1 (100) 50 57 57 53

Participant

13 15 P 15 P 15 P

Note Greater than ¼ > , less than ¼ < , D ¼ different, S ¼ same, No. ¼ number, IC ¼ inconsistent responding, P ¼ primer. If a participants data indicates “P” under “No. of probe sets” then they were unable to advance past the primer phase where mutual and combinatorial entailment was directly trained. The number listed in each cell denotes the percentage of trials (averaged from the total number of probe sets) in which the participant selected the response indicated in the corresponding column heading. Any relation (e.g., C2 > B2 or B2 D C2) indicated will be paired with a number which denotes the percentage of trials that participant selected that relation. Participants 9 through 12 were inconsistent in selecting one response as GREATER THAN or LESS THAN the other.

14

JENNIFER L. QUINONES AND STEVEN C. HAYES Table 11 Average percentage correct and number of probe stimulus sets required for mastery of mutual and combinatorial relations for Participants 13–16 for Experiment 2: Condition 3 (SAME biasing) Mutual Entailment

Participant 13 14 15 16

Combinatorial Entailment

B1 > A1 C1 < A1

B2 < A2 A2 >C2

B1 > C1 C1 < B1

B1 D C1 C1 D B1

B2-C2 as S or D

B2-C2 as > or
IC IC

5 4 5 5

Note. Greater than ¼ > , less than ¼ < , D ¼ different, S ¼ same, No. ¼ number, IC ¼ inconsistent responding. The number listed in each cell denotes the percentage of trials in which the participant selected the response (averaged from the total number of probes) as indicated in the corresponding column heading.

pretraining phase where the mutual entailment relation is directly trained through multiple exemplars instead of derived). Two of the six participants (Participants 7 and 9) did pass this pREP pretraining but failed to show consistent responding for GREATER THAN/LESS THAN or SAME/DIFFERENT trials. Participant 7 did correctly respond to the mutually entailed relations for both networks (for 96% and 100% of the opportunities) while Participant 9 correctly responded to those relations for the ambiguous network (83% of the time). Thus, without relational pretraining participants did not replicate the patterns seen in Experiment 1. Condition 3. Table 11 summarizes the data for Condition 3: SAME biasing group. All four of the participants correctly identified the mutually and combinatorially entailed GREATER THAN/ LESS THAN relations at 85% or higher. Also, all of the participants classified the unambiguous combinatorial relation (B1 and C1 stimuli) as DIFFERENT and the ambiguous combinatorial

relation (B2 and C2 stimuli) as SAME at least 80% of the time. Similar to the Experiment 1, of the participants (or those in Condition 1 of Experiment 2) who spontaneously classified the ambiguous combinatorial relation as SAME, none consistently classified one stimulus as greater than or less than another. For example, Participant 14 selected GREATER THAN for all probe trials (e.g., B2 > C2, C2 > B2). Condition 4. Table 12 summarizes the data for Condition 4: DIFFERENT biasing group. All four of the participants correctly identified the mutual and combinatorial derived relations in the Unambiguous Network at 85% or higher. All of the participants classified the ambiguous combinatorial relation as DIFFERENT at least 90% of the time. Three of these four participants (18, 19, and 20) responded similarly to participants in Experiment 1 and Condition 1 of Experiment 2: they consistently classified one stimulus as greater than or less than another. Participants 18 and 19 picked B2 as GREATER THAN C2 (for 92% and 95% of the occasions,

Table 12 Average percentage correct and number of probe stimulus sets required for mastery of mutual and combinatorial relations for Participants 17–20 for Experiment 2: Condition 4 (DIFFERENT biasing) Mutual Entailment Participant 17 18 19 20

Combinatorial Entailment

B1 > A1 C1 < A1

B2 < A2 A2 >C2

B1 > C1 C1 < B1

B1 D C1 C1 D B1

B2-C2 as S or D

B2-C2 as > or
C2; C2 < B2 (92) B2 > C2; C2 < B2 (95) B2 < C2; C2 > B2 (85)

5 6 5 5

Note. Greater than ¼ > , less than ¼ < , D ¼ different, S ¼ same, No. ¼ number. Number listed in each cell denotes the percentage of trials in which the participant selected the response indicated in the corresponding column heading. Any relation (e.g., C2 > B2; B2 < C2) indicated will be paired with a number which denotes the percentage of trials that participant selected that relation.

AMBIGUOUS STIMULUS NETWORKS respectively) while Participant 20 picked C2 as GREATER THAN B2 (85%). The nonsense syllables for Participant 18 were ZOD and HIN for stimuli B2 and C2, respectively. For Participant 19, the syllables were ZOD and VEK (for B2 and C2, respectively). Similar to Participants 2 and 3 of Experiment 1, Participants 18 and 19 may have responded based on the alphabetical order of the syllables. However, the syllables for Participant 20 were QUB (B2) and GAV (C2) and since this participant classified C2 > B2, alphabetical order was not the factor. Participant 17 did not consistently classify the DIFFERENT relation along the dimension of GREATER THAN/LESS THAN (classifying B2 < C2 on 70% of opportunities and C2 > B2 on 60% of the opportunities, two probe blocks of which he either always chose GREATER THAN or always chose LESS THAN). This participant was the lone one in both experiments who did not show relational coherence in this respect. Discussion These results largely replicate and considerably extend those seen in Experiment 1. Without relational pretraining, responding was difficult to characterize across the participants. When provided with relational pretraining, however, all participants classified the combinatorial relation of the unambiguous network as DIFFERENT. Four of the Condition 1 (replication of Experiment 1) participants classified the combinatorial relation of the ambiguous network as SAME while two classified it as DIFFERENT (66% as compared to the 50% rate shown in Experiment 1 despite the addition of instructions in Condition 1 to not pay attention to alphabetical order). As mentioned earlier, since B2 and C2 are both LESS THAN A2, they share a property that may lead some participants to conclude they are the SAME. Finally, similar to Experiment 1, those who classified the ambiguous relation as SAME did not consistently pick one stimulus as greater than the other but all those who classified this relation as DIFFERENT did so (see Table 9), suggesting the relevance of relational coherence in predicting relational responding. The most important aspect of Experiment 2 was the attempt to bias responding in the ambiguous network toward SAME or DIFFERENT by reinforced pretraining with English language sets. The results for the participants in

15

the biasing conditions support the view that a history of reinforced relational responding, in combination with relational coherence, allowed the responses seen in Experiment 1 and the replication condition in Experiment 2 to be predicted and influenced. All eight participants were successfully biased toward SAME or DIFFERENT in the Ambiguous Network and all but one of those showed relational coherence between coordination/distinction and comparative relational responding. Participant 17 was the only participant who failed to show coherence between coordination/distinction and comparative relations (see Table 12). This participant classified the ambiguous stimuli as DIFFERENT but did not consistently classify one stimulus as greater than or less than another. It is possible that he generated a rule about the set of nonsense syllables he had (which were ZYR for B2 and FAF for C2) and therefore found these stimuli different along a dimension other than GREATER THAN/LESS THAN. The participant may also have responded strictly according to his history (pick DIFFERENT) but did not respond along the dimension of GREATER THAN/LESS THAN since a history or rule was not provided and therefore he did not find it important to earn points. General Discussion Many relations among stimuli are only partially specified by training or by unambiguous processes of derivation of stimulus relations. One person may believe that today’s unavoidable accident is part of the same pattern as yesterday’s failed test, and finds it hard to say which one was worse. Another will view the failed test as different from the accident and indeed far worse, since it was avoidable with proper preparation. The facts are the same— the derived relations among them vary from person to person. In broad terms the present experiments suggest that learning histories are involved in resolving ambiguous networks. It is worth noting, however, that the experimentally established histories in the present studies focused on a small part of the tested stimulus network but resulted in consistent patterns of derived relations in other parts of the network, seemingly based on the coherence of relational responding. Given an ambiguous network, those who derived a

16

JENNIFER L. QUINONES AND STEVEN C. HAYES

frame of coordination could not consistently compare the two stimuli as the experiment allowed, while those who derived a frame of distinction did so. When these initial relational frames were experimentally manipulated, the same pattern resulted. No participant required more than two training blocks to meet the mastery criterion for multiple exemplar training biasing the initial relational response to ambiguous networks. The minimal number of exemplars required is consistent with previous research (BarnesHolmes, Barnes-Holmes, Roche, & Smeets, 2001a, 2001b; Healy, Barnes-Holmes, & Smeets, 2000) and suggests that the relational repertoire was already established and multiple exemplar training facilitated its control by specified cues. Because comparative relational frames in these networks were intertwined with frames of coordination or distinction, the change in this one aspect of the network altered the “meaning of the information” in the entire network. This seems to provide a beginning translational model of how cognitive styles and errors can come to dominate. From a real world standpoint, many of the possible stimulus relations people detect are logically ambiguous, but that does not mean that they are psychologically ambiguous. For example, one person may readily conclude that “an enemy of my enemy is my friend;” while another may take a wait and see attitude about whether that single shared relational attribute with another person implies a strong bond between them. There is a limitation in the current investigation. Only about 65% of the participants initially enrolled in the two experiments passed the pREP training of the two networks (Phase 2). Several participants dropped out due to the complexity of the study. Participants who failed this phase reported that they “just didn’t get it” or that they “couldn’t remember everything.” The pREP training includes training on a primer set of trials in which mutual entailment is directly trained. Even so, two participants could not pass through this pretraining phase. This limited the participants to those who were more experienced or facile in dealing with abstract stimuli and/or perhaps those were more fluent in vocabulary and/or mathematics (O’Hora, Pelaez, Barnes-Holmes, & Amesty, 2005). The difficulty participants had with the task came in part because the structure of the training included mixed comparatives (i.e.,

A1 < B1; A1 > C1) instead of simply the same comparatives (e.g., A1 < B1 and C1 < A1) which has been shown to be more difficult for participants to learn when combined with ambiguous relations (Hunter, 1957; Vitale, Barnes-Holmes & Barnes-Holmes, 2008; Vitale, Campbell, Barnes-Holmes & Barnes-Holmes, 2012). That has especially been true if the training is also nonlinear (Clark, 1969; Mani & Johnson-Laird, 1982; Reilly, Whelan, & BarnesHolmes, 2005; Vitale et al., 2008; Vitale et al., 2012) as it was in the current investigation. Furthermore, the relations that were tested (SAME and DIFFERENT) were different from the relations that were trained (GREATER THAN/LESS THAN) which would also make the task more difficult (Munnelly, Dymond, & Hinton, 2010). In the context of this previous research, the percentage of participants proceeding through the pREP training of the two networks is about what would be expected. In addition, the experimental presentation of the stimuli using the pREP procedure is a simultaneous protocol as all baseline relations are trained concurrently followed by the concurrent testing of all emergent relations, which is known to produce low yields. The procedure could be enhanced by, for example, using a simple-tocomplex protocol and slowly increasing nodal number and members (Fields et al., 1997). A second, possible limitation included a particular aspect of the instructions. During the training and testing of the networks in Phase 2, the instructions provided to the subjects informed them that only one choice would be correct. This was meant to inform the subjects to select one choice out of the two available on any given trial. However, some subjects may have interpreted this message to mean only one of the two was correct throughout. In the ambiguous network, any choice (GREATER THAN/ LESS THAN; SAME/DIFFERENT) could have been selected and deemed “correct” by the computer program. As such, subjects may have responded in a manner that encouraged only one choice and then continued to select the response that was coherent given their original choice. This aspect of the instruction may have precluded subjects from responding in an ‘I don’t know’ or ‘I cannot know’ fashion by, for example, just selecting any response randomly when presented with the ambiguous relation during testing trials. For subjects who interpreted the message in this manner, it might

17

AMBIGUOUS STIMULUS NETWORKS suggest a strong reliance on rule-governed behavior. Subjects were instructed in Experiment 2 to not allow alphabetical order to play a role but it is possible that they did not follow this rule. Considering most subjects seemed unable to describe their reasoning, possibly due to the length of the study, the subjects may have relied heavily on the contingencies. In Conditions 3 and 4 of Experiment 2, bias training was presented between subjects as opposed to within subjects. In our opinion it could be very difficult to reverse such training, and thus it is cleaner and less ambiguous to begin exploration of this new area with a betweensubjects approach. A within-subject control would be interesting and worthwhile but if it reversed easily it could end up addressing immediate stimulus control issues, which was not our focus. This research strategy may be an area for future research. Another area for future research could be the use of abstract stimuli for training the networks. Three-letter nonsense syllables were used in the present investigation, as opposed to abstract stimuli, in order to stay closer to a method for testing implicit relations we originally planned to use, that had only been validated with real words (DeHouwer, 2003). The present study may help explain odd forms of thinking, such as paranoia, prejudice, or self-aggrandizing delusions. Cognitive errors may at times be trained in whole cloth, but the more dominant situation appears to be one in which a key relational feature leads to a kind of cognitive cascade as people try to make verbal sense of their world. Verbal processes are often asked to do more than they can do, such as explaining histories or situations that are not fully known (or may not be even be fully knowable). “Why” questions are clinically common verbal forms that seemingly demand an answer—much as the experimental procedure in the present study demanded that participants specify whether B and C were SAME or DIFFERENT, even in ambiguous networks. There was no “I have thoughts but they are just thoughts” option in the present experiments. Providing this option may be useful in future research and it may provide additional insight into the subject’s verbal processes. However, this option is also not generally present culturally. For example, parents ask even young children “why did you do that?” and they will demand an answer much as if four-years olds are psychological

scientists who in fact should understand all there is to be understood about their own behavior. The answers to such clinical questions as “Why am I like this?” or just “Why did that happen to me?” may be worth seeking, but avoidance of cognitive errors seem to begin with what is often missed: The best and most rational response to ambiguity is often to acknowledge ignorance rather than to declare “an answer.” That is precisely what clinical behavior-analytic methods such as Acceptance and Commitment Therapy attempt to do (Hayes, Strosahl, & Wilson, 2011) and the present results provide one indication of why that approach might be helpful. References Barnes-Holmes, Y., Barnes-Holmes, D., Roche, B., & Smeets, P. M. (2001a). Exemplar training and a derived transformation of function in accordance with symmetry. The Psychological Record, 51, 287–308. Barnes-Holmes, Y., Barnes-Holmes, D., Roche, B., & Smeets, P. M. (2001b). Exemplar training and a derived transformation of function in accordance with symmetry: II. The Psychological Record, 51, 589–603. Barnes-Holmes, D., Barnes-Holmes, Y., Stewart, I., & Boles, S. (2010). A sketch of the implicit relational assessment procedure (IRAP) and the relational elaboration and coherence (REC) model. The Psychological Record, 60(3), 527–542. Beck, A. T., & Emery, G. (1985). Anxiety disorders and phobias: A cognitive perspective. New York: Basic Books. Clark, H. H. (1969). Linguistic processes in deductive reasoning. Psychological Review, 76, 387–404. Cullinan, V., Barnes, D., & Smeets, P. M. (1998). A precursor to the relational evaluation procedure: Analyzing stimulus equivalence. The Psychological Record, 48, 121– 145. Cullinan, V., Barnes-Holmes, D., & Smeets, P. M. (2000). A precursor to the relational evaluation procedure: Analyzing stimulus equivalence II. The Psychological Record, 50, 476–492. Cullinan, V., Barnes-Holmes, D., & Smeets, P. M. (2001). A precursor to the relational evaluation procedure: Searching for the contextual cues that control equivalence responding. Journal of the Experimental Analysis of Behavior, 76, 339–349. DeHouwer, J. (2003). The Extrinsic Affective Simon Task. Experimental Psychology, 50(2), 77–85. DeHouwer, J. (2011). Why the cognitive approach in psychology would profit from a functional approach and vice versa. Perspectives on Psychological Science, 6(2), 202–209. Devany, J. M., Hayes, S. C., & Nelson, R. O. (1986). Equivalence class formation in language-able and language-disabled children. Journal of the Experimental Analysis of Behavior, 46, 243–257. Ellis, A. (1999). Early theories and practices of rational emotive behavior therapy and how they have been augmented and revised during the last three decades. Journal of Rational-Emotive & Cognitive-Behavior Therapy, 17(2), 69–93.

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O’Hora, D., Pelaez, M., Barnes-Holmes, D., & Amesty, L. (2005). Derived relational responding and human language: Evidence from the WAIS-III. The Psychological Record, 55, 155–174. Quinones, J. L. (2008). Relational coherence and transformation of function in ambiguous and unambiguous relational networks. Doctoral dissertation, University of Nevada at Reno. Reilly, T., Whelan, R., & Barnes-Holmes, D. (2005). The effect of training structure on the latency of responses to a five-term linear chain. The Psychological Record, 55, 233– 249. Saunders, R. R., Saunders, K. J., Kirby, K. C., & Spradlin, J. E. (1988). The merger and development of equivalence classes by unreinforced conditional selection of comparison stimuli. Journal of the Experimental Analysis of Behavior, 50, 145–162. Steele, D., & Hayes, S. C. (1991). Stimulus equivalence and arbitrarily applicable relational responding. Journal of the Experimental Analysis of Behavior, 56, 519–555. Vitale, A., Barnes-Holmes, Y., & Barnes-Holmes, D. (2008). Facilitating responding in accordance with the relational frame of comparison: Systematic empirical analyses. The Psychological Record, 58, 365–390. Vitale, A., Campbell, C., Barnes-Holmes, Y., & BarnesHolmes, D. (2012). Facilitating responding in accordance with the relational frame of comparison II: Methodological analyses. The Psychological Record, 62, 663–675. Wulfert, E., Dougher, M., & Greenway, D. (1991). Protocol analysis of the correspondence of verbal behavior and equivalence class formation. Journal of the Experimental Analysis of Behavior, 56(3), 489–504.

Received: August 15, 2013 Final Acceptance: November 26, 2013