Extinction of a Human Cardiac-Response during Avoidance-Conditioning

Author(s): P. J. Bersh, J. M. Notterman and W. N. Schoenfeld

Source: The American Journal of Psychology, Vol. 69, No. 2 (Jun., 1956), pp. 244-251
Published by: University of Illinois Press
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EXTINCTION OF A HUMAN CARDIAC-RESPONSE DURING
AVOIDANCE-CONDITIONING
By
P.
J.
BERSH,
Human Factors
Laboratory,
Rome Air
Development
Center,
Rome, N.Y.,
J.
M. NOTTERMAN and W. N.
SCHOENFELD,
Columbia
University
Since
avoidance-conditioning always
involves,
at least at the
outset,
the
exposure
of S to the
negatively reinforcing ('noxious'
or
'to-be-avoided')
stimulus,
it is now
generally recognized
that the Pavlovian
paradigm,
with
the
negatively reinforcing
stimulus
acting
as
US,
applies
with
significant
consequences.
The
joint
occurrence of
autonomically-mediated
CRs and
the instrumental
avoidance-response (RAV)
raises the
possibility
of interac-
tion between the two
response-systems,'
and this
possibility
makes de-
sirable the simultaneous measurement and
study
of
representative
reflexes
in both
systems.
One initial
hypothesis
on which
agreement might presently
be
expected
is that the autonomic CRs
acquired during avoidance-training
tend toward
extinction on 'successful' avoidance-trials
(i.e.
trials on which the
experi-
mentally prescribed
RAV
is made and US is not
forthcoming),
in accord-
ance with the Pavlovian
paradigm
for extinction.
Nevertheless,
the litera-
ture seems to contain no data
indicating
that such extinction
actually
occurs,
and one
purpose
of the
experiments reported
here is to furnish that evi-
dence. It will also
appear
that the
weakening
of CR arises
partly
from the
discriminative control over CR assumed
by
stimuli which are
produced by,
or
accompany,
RAV,
and which thus
play
the role of
negative
stimuli in the
Pavlovian method of contrasts.2
*
Received for
publication May 19, 1955. These studies were
supported by
funds
provided
under Contract AF
18(600)-69
with the USAF School of Aviation Medi-
cine, Randolph Field,
Texas.
1W. N. Schoenfeld and
J. J. Antonitis,
A function of
respondents
in the extinc-
tion of
operant responses, Notes, Conf. Exper.
Anal.
Behav.,
No.
17, May 9, 1949,
issued from Indiana Univ.
(mimeographed); Schoenfeld,
An
experimental approach
to
anxiety, escape,
and avoidance
behavior,
in
Anxiety,
edited
by
P. H. Hoch
and
Joseph Zubin, 1950, 70-99; J.
M.
Notterman, Experimental anxiety
and a con-
ditioned heart rate
response
in human
beings,
Trans. N. Y. Acad.
Sci., Ser. II, 16,
1953, 24-33.
W. N.
Schoenfeld,
P.
J. Bersh,
and
J.
M.
Notterman,
Interaction of instru-
mental and autonomic
responses
in avoidance
conditioning, Science, 120, 1954, 788,
(Abstract).
244
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EXTINCTION OF A HUMAN CARDIAC-RESPONSE
EXPERIMENT I
The
purpose
of the
experiment
was to
compare
the
magnitude
of a
cardiac CR after
acquisition
of a motor
avoidance-response
with
CR-mag-
nitude
prior
to
avoidance-training.
Procedure. In the first
experiment,
as well as in two others to be
reported,
the
autonomic CR under observation was one
previously
studied
by
the authors as a
function of several
parameters,
i.e. the decrease in heart-rate
produced
in human
Ss
by repeated exposure
to tone
(CS)
followed
by
electric shock
(US).3
The same
laboratory arrangements, apparatus,
and
general procedure
were
employed
as in
the
previous
studies cited. The cardiac CR was measured
by comparing pre-CS
heart-rate with rate
during
the CS-US
interval,
and a
trace-conditioning procedure
was
used, consisting
of a 1-sec.
tone,
a 6-sec. tone-shock
interval,
and a 6-sec.
shock. Additional
particulars
of
procedure
are
given
for each of the three
experi-
ments
reported.
Twenty college
students
(men)
served as Ss.4 There were three
experimental
phases: (a)
determination of basal
(pre-conditioning)
heart-rate
response
to the
tone, (b)
cardiac
conditioning, (c)
establishment of an
avoidance-response (key-
tapping).
All
phases
were administered to each S in a
single
session
lasting ap-
proximately
2 hr.
After S entered the
laboratory,
he was asked to
strip
to the
waist,
and the
cardiograph
and shock electrodes were
placed. During
these
preparations,
the fol-
lowing
instructions were
given by
E.
This is an
experiment
to determine
your
heart-rate reaction to
tone,
and
your
heart-rate reaction to electric shock. You will hear a series of tones
through
this
headset which will soon be
placed
over
your
ears. A little later in the
experiment
you
will receive a series of electric shocks administered to
your
left
hand; you
will
not be shocked
through
the electrodes I am now
placing
on
your
chest and left
leg.
These electrodes enable me to record
your
heart action. The shocks
you
will
receive will be
strong enough
for
you
to feel
them,
but will not be
strong enough
to do
you any
harm. Remember that
they
will
just pass through your hand,
and
not
your body.
Please
try
not to make
any unnecessary
movements. I will be
keep-
ing
a continuous record of
your
heart-action while
you
are in
here,
and since the
apparatus
is
necessarily very sensitive, your moving
around too much would inter-
fere with the
recording.'
3Notterman, Schoenfeld,
and
Bersh,
Conditioned heart rate
response
in human
beings during experimental anxiety,
J.
comp. physiol. Psychol., 45, 1952, 1-8;
Partial reinforcement and conditioned heart rate
response
in human
subjects, Science,
115, 1952, 77-79;
A
comparison
of three extinction
procedures following
heart rate
conditioning,
J.
abnorm. soc.
Psychol., 47, 1952, 674-677; Bersh, Schoenfeld,
and
Notterman,
The effect
upon
heart rate
conditioning
of
randomly varying
the inter-
val between conditioned and unconditioned
stimuli,
Proc. Nat. Acad.
Sci., 39, 1953,
563-570.
4 These Ss remained of an
original group
of 28. Three Ss were discarded for failure
to show the cardiac CR at all within the 8 trials set aside for
acquisition (compare
number of trials in earlier studies
cited).
Five Ss were discarded for failure to learn
RAv to the
given
criterion
(see "Procedure")
before 17 shocks were administered.
These
shocks, together
with those of
acquisition, represented
about the maximal
number that Ss cared to endure
during
a
single
2-hr. session.
5
Cf.
the
procedure
and instructions of earlier studies cited.
245
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BERSH, NOTTERMAN,
AND SCHOENFELD
Then E left S's room and entered the
adjacent apparatus
room. The basal trials
were
begun immediately
thereafter. A series of 20 1-sec.
tones, spaced irregularly
1-2 min.
apart,
was sent
through
the
headset,
S's
cardiogram being
taken continu-
ously
from about 30 sec. before to about 30 sec. after each tone. As in the
previous studies,
rate was measured
by determining
the
period
of the last two
cardiac
cycles immediately preceding
onset of
tone,
and the
period
of the last
two
cycles
in the 6-sec. interval
following
tone
(and, therefore, immediately pre-
ceding
shock on the
subsequent
tone-shock
trials).
These
measures,
called the
'pre-
tone' and
'post-tone' rates, respectively,
were then converted to
beats-per-min.
Following
the basal
series,
cardiac
conditioning
was
begun immediately
for all
Ss without further instruction. This
phase
consisted of
eight
tone-shock trials. It
may
be noted here that the first occasion on which tone is followed
by
shock
(Trial
1 of cardiac
conditioning) is,
insofar as S's cardiac
response
to tone is con-
cerned,
another basal trial. It is
only
on the second trial of
conditioning
that
any
conditioning
effect to tone
may
be exhibited. For this
reason,
in the
computations
and tables
reported,
the first trial of cardiac
conditioning
has been treated as the
last basal trial.
Upon
conclusion of the
eighth
cardiac
conditioning trial,
all Ss were
given
the
following
instructions.
From now
on,
if
you tap
this
key
once as soon as
you
hear the
tone,
and once
again
at a certain
specific
time-interval after the first
tap, you
will not receive the
shock. You have to determine for
yourself
what the
proper
interval is between the
two
taps. Keep your
hand near the
key.
These instructions were
repeated
a second
time,
after which a
telegraph key
was
put
in
position
on the table near S's
right
hand.
If,
on the
succeeding
motor-
conditioning,
S
tapped
the
key
for the second time
during
the fourth second after
termination of
CS,
shock was not
given
at the conclusion of the usual 6-sec. trace-
period. Motor-conditioning
was considered achieved when S
successfully
avoided
shock on five consecutive trials
(the criterion-trials)
before
receiving
17 shocks.
During
each trial of the
motor-conditioning phase,
heart-rate was recorded in the
usual
way (from
30 sec. before tone to 30 sec. after shock would
normally
terminate).
Results. The cardiac measures are summarized in Table I. The difference
between the mean
pre-tone
and
post-tone
rates
during
the basal
phase
is not
significant.6
The effect of the
conditioning
trials is shown in the conditioned
decrement which is
significantly greater
than zero and also
significantly
greater
than the basal decrement
(P<0.01). During RAy criterion-trials,
the
magnitude
of CR is
reduced;
it is still
significantly
above zero and above
the basal
drop (P<0.05),
but
significantly
smaller than the CR
during
ac-
quisition (P<0.05).
The
weakening
of CR
during
the
RAV
criterion-trials
is further attested
by
the fact that 15 of the 20 Ss
(15/20 gives P<0.03)
show a smaller CR
during
the
RAV
criterion-trials than
they
did at the
6
All conclusions
concerning
statistical
significance
are based on Wilcoxon's non-
parametric
tests for
paired
and
non-paired replicates (Frank Wilcoxon,
Individual
comparisons by ranking methods,
Biometric
Bull., 1, 1945, 80-83).
246
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EXTINCTION OF A HUMAN CARDIAC-RESPONSE
end of
acquisition (despite
the increase in resistance to extinction which
presumably
arises from the
partial
reinforcement schedule to which CR
is
exposed during
the
acquisition
of
RAy).7
In
brief,
the conclusion indi-
cated
by
the data is that
autonomically-mediated
CRs involved in avoid-
ance
training
do,
in
fact,
tend to
extinguish
in the
expected
manner
during
RAV
trials.
One
possible
artifact to be considered in connection with this conclusion
is the unconditioned effect of
RAV
(in
this
case,
the
tapping
of a
telegraph
key) upon
the cardiac-measure
employed,
since it is
commonly recognized
that skeletal
responses
tend to raise cardiac-rate. This
effect, counteracting
the cardiac
CR-drop, might
have created the false
impression
that ex-
tinction had occurred. That this artifact did not
operate
in the
present
experiment
is indicated
by
control data
reported
elsewhere.8
While the
present
data indicate that the effect of
RAy
on CR is in the
expected
direction,
this effect is not
large,
since CR remains
significantly
above zero and above the basal level.
Although many
conditions of the
experiment might
account for such a
result,
including
the
particular
RAV
criterion
involved,
one
likely
basis
may
be the
'externally unsupported'
na-
ture of the
temporally-discriminated
RAV
used here. The
possibility
of
speeding
extinction of the CR
by providing
an
exteroceptive
stimulus as-
sociated
with,
and
marking,
RAV
therefore
suggests
itself. This
possibility
led to the
performance
of
Experiment
II.
EXPERIMENT II
The
purpose
of this
experiment
was to determine whether an
exterocep-
tive stimulus associated with an
avoidance-response
influences the ex-
tinction of the associated cardiac CR.
Procedure. Ten students
(men)
served as Ss.9 The
procedure
of this
experiment
was identical with that of
Experiment I,
except that, immediately upon
occurrence
of a 'successful'
avoidance-response,
E
presented
a
signal-light
of 1.5-sec. duration.
The
light
was
provided by
a small
lamp positioned
on the wall in front of S and
approximately
at
eye-level.
On trials
during
which S made an 'incorrect'
key-tapping
response,
no
light-signal
was
given.
No mention was made of the
light-stimulus
during
the instructions or
during any phase
of the
experiment.
7Notterman, Schoenfeld,
and
Bersh,
Partial reinforcement and conditioned heart
rate
response
in human
subjects, op. cit.,
77-79.
8Notterman, Experimental anxiety
and a conditioned heart rate
response
in
human
beings, op. cit., 31; Notterman, Schoenfeld,
and
Bersh,
A
comparison
of
three extinction
procedures following
heart rate
conditioning, op. cit., 676-677.
9
Two other Ss were eliminated from the
experiment
for failure to demonstrate
cardiac
conditioning,
and six for failure to attain the criterion of avoidance-con-
ditioning criterion,
within the number of trials allotted to each of these two
phases
of the
experiment.
247
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BERSH, NOTTERMAN,
AND SCHOENFELD
Results. The results of this
experiment
are summarized in Table I.
As in the first
experiment,
the obtained cardiac CR was
significant
well
beyond
the
1%
level of confidence at the end of
acquisition. Although
only
10.5 trials
(median)
were taken
by
this
group
to reach the avoidance-
criterion
(as
compared
with 16.0 in
Experiment I)-possibly reflecting
the
acquisition
of
secondary reinforcing properties by
the
light-the
dif-
ference between the two values is not
significant. During
the
RAv
criterion-
TABLE I
MEAN CARDIAC RESPONSE
(BEATS
PER
MIN.)
DURING EACH OF THE THREE
PHASES OP EXPERIMENTS I AND II
(Last
ii basal
determinations,
last
5 conditioning
trials,
and
5 RAV
criterion
trials)
Experiment
I
Experiment
II
Phase
Pre- Post- Diff. Pre- Post Diff.
tone tone tone tone
Basal 80.8
79.4 I.4 77.7 77.9
-0.2
Conditioning 81.7 73.2 8.5*
78.
70.5 7.6*
RAV
criterion
80.o 75.0 5.0* 77.5 75.8 1.7
*
Significant beyond
the
I%
level of confidence
by
Wilcoxon's test for
paired replicates.
Individual data
may
be obtained from the American Documentation Institute.
trials,
strength
of cardiac CR had diminished to a
non-significant
level;
moreover,
9 of the 10 Ss
(9/10 gives P<0.01)
showed a smaller CR
during RAY
criterion-trials than
they
did at the end of
acquisition.10
A
possible explanation
of this result is that the
exteroceptive
stimulus cor-
related with
RAV
facilitates the
development
of a discrimination in which
light
comes to be the
negative
stimulus.
There exists the
possibility,
however,
that the effect of the
light may
be
unconditioned,
and therefore not attributable to
discrimination-learning.
This
possibility
was
explored during
the third
experiment.
'0
It
may
be noted that the Ss of the two
experiments
did not differ
significantly
in cardiac
response prior
to
avoidance-training. Neither, however,
did
they
differ
significantly
in cardiac
response during
the
avoidance-phase,
which
may
be taken
to
imply
that the introduction of the
light
failed to effect the cardiac CR. This
conclusion
might
also be drawn from two other
comparisons: first,
with
respect
to the number of Ss
showing
diminished CRs
during
RAT criterion-trials as com-
pared
with the end of
acquisition (the 15/20
in
Experiment
I does not differ
significantly
from the
9/10 in
Experiment II);
and
secondly,
with
respect
to the
distributions of differences between the
CR-magnitudes
in the basal and RAV
criterion-stages
which are not
significantly
different in the two
experiments.
Never-
theless,
such an
interpretation
must be
weighed against
the fact that when the
group
in each
experiment
is taken as its own
control, strength
of CR
during
RAV
criterion-trials remains at a
significant
level in
Experiment
I but not in
Experi-
ment II.
248
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EXTINCTION OF A HUMAN CARDIAC-RESPONSE
EXPERIMENT III
The
purpose
of this
experiment
was to ascertain the unconditioned effect
upon
cardiac rate of the
exteroceptive
stimulus of
Experiment
II,
and to
determine whether that stimulus can assume discriminative control over
cardiac CR
through training by
the method of contrasts.
Procedure. Eleven
college
students
(men)
served as
Ss,
each
being taken,
in a
single
session
lasting
about 2.5
hr., through
three consecutive
experimental phases:
basal, acquisition,
and
discrimination-training.
Before the start of the basal
phase,
and while the electrodes were
being attached,
each S was
given
the same initial
instructions as in
Experiments
I and II. The basal
phase
consisted of 10 trials of
tone-alone
(T)
and 10 trials of
tone-light (TL),
randomized
separately
for each
S in such a manner that the
separate
unconditioned effect of T and TL
upon
heart-
rate
might
later be evaluated. The tone lasted 1
sec.,
the
light
1.5
sec.;
on TL
trials,
the
light
was
presented
at the start of the fourth second after the tone. The
acquisi-
tion-phase
consisted of
eight positive
trials
(T+)
in which tone was followed
by
shock,
a
procedure employed
to
produce
a cardiac CR of some
strength
before the
introduction of
contrasting
unreinforced trials associated with the
negative
stimulus.
Since these trials followed basal trials without
interruption,
the first T+ trial was
considered a basal
trial;
similarly,
the first discrimination-trial was considered
another
acquisition trial,
42 discrimination-trials
being given
in all. The discrimina-
tion-phrase
consisted of
positive (T+)
and
negative (TL-) trials, duplicating
the
stimulus-shock correlations of
Experiment II,
with 7 T+ trials
randomly interspersed
among
the first 15 TL-
trials,
4 T+ trials
randomly interspersed among
the last
15 TL-
trials,
and with the last trial
being positive (T+)
for all Ss. On all T+
trials,
the time-relations were the same as in the
previous experiments (a
6-sec.
shock administered 6 sec. after the end of the
tone).
On TL-
trials,
the same
light
and
arrangements
were used as in
Experiment
II. The
key
used for RAv in the two
earlier
experiments
was not
present
for this
experiment,
since no RAV was involved.
Results. The data indicate that the unconditioned effect of TL
during
basal trials was to decelerate heart-rate
significantly.
Thus,
the
pre-tone
mean of the last 5 basal trials of 'tone-alone' was
75.2,
the
post-tone
mean
was
73.3,
and the difference of
1.9
was,
as usual in all
previous
work,
non-
significant.
The
pre-tone
mean of the last 5 basal trials of
tone-light
was
75.2,
the
post-tone
mean was
72.1,
and the difference of
3.1
was
signif-
icant
beyond
the
1%
level of
confidence.l1
This unconditioned cardiac-
deceleration to TL
is,
of
course,
in the
opposite
direction to its effect
upon
cardiac CR in
Experiment
II,
and
strengthens
the conclusion that the
consequence
of
adding
the
light
to
RAv
in
Experiment
II was not an artifact
but a
genuine speeding
of cardiac extinction.
The conclusion that the more
rapid
extinction in
Experiment
II resulted
"1E. J.
G.
Pitman,
Notes on Non-Parametric Statistical
Inference, Department
Mathematical
Statistics,
Columbia
Univ., 1948.
249
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BERSH, NOTTERMAN,
AND SCHOENFELD
from the discriminative action of the
light
receives further confirmation
from the data of
Fig.
1 which shows the cardiac
response
to T+ and TL-
during
the
discrimination-training.
The values
plotted
are
averages
for
every
two
sequential
T+ trials and for
every
block of five
sequential
TL-
trials,
reflecting
the 2:5 ratio of
frequencies
of the two
presentations.
The
TONE-LIGHT
(-)
TRIALS
0
o
1-5 6-10 11-15 16-20 21-25 26-30
9
O
-
9oT LT+
8
7
Z
__
0z6
a
5-
2 3-4 -6 7-8 9-10 11-12
TONE
(+)
TRIALS
FIG. 1. DISCRIMINATIVE CONTROL OVER A CARDIAC CR ESTABLISHED BY THE
METHOD OF CONTRASTS IN EXPERIMENT III.
"
-
<
| 3 4
u 2-
T+ values are averages for two sequential trials; TL- values are averages for
Q-
1-2 3-4 5-6 7-8 9-10 11-12
TONE
(+)
TRIALS
FIG. 1. DISCRIMINATIVE CONTROL OVER A CARDIAC CR ESTABLISHED BY THE
METHOD OF CONTRASTS IN EXPERIMENT III.
T+ values are
averages
for two
sequential trials;
TL- values are
averages
for
five
sequential
trials.
cardiac CR seems to
generalize
well from T+ to TL- at the end of
acquisi-
tion and before differential reinforcement. The cardiac
drop
to the
negative
stimulus
during
its first five
presentations
during
the
discrimination-phase
is
significantly greater
than
during
the last five trials of the basal
phase
(0.02
< P <
0.05),
thus
indicating
a
genuine generalization
effect. A
typical progressive separation
soon
occurs, however,
in which the
positive
stimulus
produces highly significant responses
while CR to the
negative
stimulus diminishes to a level
statistically indistinguishable
from zero.
Data not included in the table
indicate,
in
fact,
that the
negative
stimulus
250
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EXTINCTION OF A HUMAN CARDIAC-RESPONSE 251
eventually
tends to
produce
cardiac acceleration. There seems little
doubt,
in view of these
findings,
that discriminative control
by
an
exteroceptive
stimulus over the cardiac CR is
possible,
and,
consequently,
that the
light
accompanying
RAy
in
Experiment
II
might
have,
as
argued
there,
served
this added discriminative function.
SUMMARY
Three
experiments
were
performed
on the effect of
avoidance-training
on a conditioned
cardiac-response
in human Ss. In
Experiment
I it was
shown that the cardiac CR tends toward extinction
during
the course of
avoidance-responding.
In
Experiment
II it was shown that extinction is
faster when an
exteroceptive signalling
stimulus is correlated with success-
ful
avoidance-responses.
In
Experiment
III it was shown that the effective-
ness of such
signalling may
be ascribed to the
development
of discrimina-
tive control over the cardiac CR.
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