Psychol Rec

DOI 10.1007/s40732-015-0134-3

ORIGINAL ARTICLE

A Simpler Route to Stimulus Equivalence? A Replication

and Further Exploration of a BSimple Discrimination Training
Procedure^ (Canovas, Debert and Pilgrim 2014)
David W. Dickins 1

# Association for Behavior Analysis International 2015

Abstract In a recent paper in this journal, Canovas, Debert

and Pilgrim (The Psychological Record, 65(2), 337346,
2015), in their second experiment, taught participants to make
one key press to each of three simple visual stimuli and an
alternative response to another three. They then trained two
new key presses to one stimulus from each class, which then
transferred to the other stimuli in each class. When subsequently presented with compounds of two stimuli, participants
indicated Bcorrect^ to within-class compounds, but
Bincorrect^ to between-class compounds. The present study
starts with a successful replication of this seemingly new way
of establishing stimulus equivalence classes, with an added
matching-to-sample test at the end. In two further experiments, the visual stimuli were replaced by non-words, with
two further non-words to be said aloud in place of key-presses.
These showed that it was possible to establish two or three
equivalence classes using such initial discrimination training,
even when the prior demonstration of functional equivalence
classes by transfer-of-training to a second set of responses was
omitted. Other ways of conceptualizing these methods of
training are considered, together with some implications for
enlarging our understanding of equivalence class formation.
Keywords Simple discrimination procedures . Stimulus
equivalence . Functional equivalence . Training structure .
Naming . Vocal responses
The formation of stimulus equivalence classes (Sidman 2000)
has been demonstrated following a variety of training
* David W. Dickins
dickins@liverpool.ac.uk
1

University of Liverpool, Liverpool, UK

procedures. Prototypical are variants of the so-called matchingto-sample (MTS) procedure, where trained relations are
established between stimuli in pairs by having one stimulus,
the sample, followed by a choice of other stimuli, the comparisons, one of which the participant is taught to choose consistently. A variant of MTS is the single comparison, alternative response procedure, or BGo/No Go^ procedure, in which the comparison may be correct or incorrect, and the participant is reinforced for indicating one or the other. A third procedure is
respondent-type training in which each sample is followed by
its correct comparison in unreinforced pairings, though the demonstration of the resultant emergent equivalence relations requires an MTS test procedure. To what extent are the behavioural manifestations of stimulus equivalence (Sidman and Tailby
1982) indifferent to such varied methods by means of which
they may be engendered? Also the yield of these procedures
the proportion of participants thus trained who form stimulus
equivalence classesis often less than all. Can any simpler ways
be found that at least as reliably have the same outcome?
Canovas, Debert and Pilgrim (2014) reported two experiments in which functional equivalence classes were
established by two different procedures that they described
as Bsimple discrimination training^. The first experiment used
repeated reversal learning, in which in one reversal each stimulus in one group of three (A1, B1, and C1) served as S+ for a
given response, and those in the other group (A2, B2, and C2)
as S-, with these roles being swapped in the next reversal. In
due course, the appropriate switch in discriminative control
was acquired by all the stimuli as soon as just one stimulus
had changed its role at the beginning of a new reversal. The
second experiment, of which the present paper is a replication
and extension, trained participants to respond on one key to
any stimulus from A1, B1, and C1, and on another key for any
stimulus from A2, B2, and C2. When this had been
established, new key responses were trained to A1 and A2

Psychol Rec

only, and then unreinforced test trials demonstrated transferof-function to B1 and C1, and B2 and C2. In both experiments, all participants were therefore deemed to have formed
two functional equivalence classes. Tests were then conducted
for emergent conditional relations between the stimuli using a
Go/No-Go procedure with compound stimuli, either withinclass or between-class pairs, respectively. Three out of the four
participants in Experiment 1 and all four in Experiment 2
generated emergent stimulus relations taken to indicate equivalence class formation.
However, in Experiment 1, performance on these compound tests, as the authors make clear, B could have been
based on directly reinforced sequences or conditional discriminations during the repeated reversal training.^ (op. cit. p. 6).
This was deemed not to apply to the Bsimple discrimination
training procedure^ in Experiment 2 [seemingly a three-term
discrimination, rather than the four-term conditional discrimination in Bmatching-to-sample^ (MTS) procedures].
The straightforwardness and effectiveness of the three stages
of this second experimentinitial discrimination training, rapid transfer of this training to new key responses, and the near
perfect performances on the compound test of equivalence relationsseemed to offer a simpler way of establishing stimulus
equivalence classes, perhaps more adaptable to younger human
participants, and even non-human species, as the authors imply
in their conclusions. To explore this procedure further, and
relate it to more conventional procedures, the first requirement
was to attempt a replication with closely similar methods. A
similar set of shape stimuli was therefore assembled, and the
authors program used in previous studies was adapted to the
discrimination, generalization, and compound Go/No-Go programs closely similar to those used by Canovas et al. Details are
given below. If this replication were successful, various aspects
would then be modified in further experiments.

Experiment 1: Replication of Canovas et al.s

Experiment 2

Equipment The tests were conducted on a large-screen

Macintosh iMac computer, and a digital voice recorder
(Olympus WS-812) was used to record verbal responses and
debriefing conversations.
Software A general purpose stimulus equivalence program
constructed by Mr. Phil Jimmieson of the University of
Liverpool Department of Computer Science was adapted by
the author to deliver the experiments. Instructions screens could
be read and moved on from in the participants own time, and
these alternated with blocks of paced trials as described below.
Stimuli Six shape stimuli (Fig. 1), similar to those used by
Canovas et al. were used for participants C1-3 (Fig. 1a for
participants C1 and C2, Fig. 1b for C3). Participants C46 were
given the same shapes as those used by Canovas et al. (Fig. 2).
Discrimination Training On each trial in a block of 12 trials,
one of the shape stimuli was presented for 2 s on the left of the
screen, after the participant was instructed as follows:
DISCRIMINATION LEARNING 1
Here is a repeating series of stimuli. Press either the K
key or the M key for each, and you will then see a BK ^
or an BM^ to show you which you should have chosen.
Blocks of these trials will be repeated until your performance is perfect.
After stimuli A1, B1, or C1, the K key was correct, and
after stimuli A2, B2, or C2, the M key was correct.
Irrespective of which key was actually selected (or after 2 s
with no response), after 1 s either the letter M or the letter K,
whichever would have been the correct response to that shape
stimulus, was presented for a further 2 s, to provide informational feedback. An intertrial interval of 1 s followed. All six
discriminative shape stimuli were presented in random order,
occurring twice in each 12-trial test block. Blocks were presented until the participant scored 12/12 correct for two successive blocks.

Method
Participants Six undergraduate students aged 1921 years
were recruited through the Department of Psychology
BExperimental Participation Recruitment Scheme^, in which
all first-year undergraduate students have to serve as participants, as a course requirement, for a specified total number of
hours in a choice of experiments.
Location This and the following experiments were conducted in an experimental room in the Psychology Department by
the author, who remained present while one participant at a
time carried out the computer-based tests and responded to the
experimenters questions in the debriefing.

Training of new key Responses to two of the Stimuli When

the training criterion had been reached, participants were then
given a similar re-training program, to the same criterion, but
using only stimuli A1 and A2, to which two new key responses were now required, B and G, respectively.
Their instructions were:
DISCRIMINATION 2
In this new stage, some of the same stimuli will again be
presented. Now you should press either the G key or the
B key for each, and you will then see a BG^ or a BB^ to
show you which you should have chosen. Again, blocks

Psychol Rec

test of the transfer of B and G responses to B1 and C1,

and B2 and C2, respectively. The instructions were:
TESTING WITHOUT FEEDBACK
In this phase, you should continue to respond using the
BG^ and BB^ keys. Try to respond according to what
you learned in previous phases. You will not be shown
whether or not you responded correctly on a trial because the correct key letters will not be shown.
The same criterion of mastery was again applied. If thiswas
not attained, participants were returned to the original training
program and the same stages were repeated as above. Once
mastery had been established on the transfer-of-function test,
the following test was given.

Fig. 1 Shape stimuli used in the present study (a) for participants C1 and
C2, and (b) for C3

Compound Stimuli and the Go/No-Go Test This test

Canovas et al. described as an Bemergent relations test^, using
a BGo/No-Go procedure with compound stimuli^. Here,
Bcompound^ simply meant two stimuli simultaneously present on the screen, one on the left and the other on the right, for
2 s. In the first test, these compounds comprised A1 or A2 on
the left with either B1 or B2 on the right, and B1 or B2 on the
left followed by either C1 or C2 on the right. These eight
combinations were presented twice each in random order on
each of four 16-trial test blocks. The instruction screen preceding each test block read as follows:
COMBINATION TESTS
In the following series of tests, your task will be modified. You should respond on the C key to stimulus pairs
you think are correct and respond on the N key to the
stimulus pairs you think are not correct. Try to respond
according to what you learned in the previous phases.
You will get no feedback on these trials.

of these trials will be repeated until your performance is

perfect.

Transfer-of-Function Test When the new responses had

been established to stimuli A1 and A2, the third program
was presented in which only the remaining stimuli B1,
B2, C1 and C2, were used. No informational feedback
was given on this program, however, which constituted a

Note that here, unlike Canovas et al., who only required a

response to compounds the participant deemed Bcorrect^, an
alternative key response was required for Bnot correct^ combinations. Response latencies were also recorded. There was a
400-ms inter-trial interval.
Three such sets of tests were given in succession, the first
with the AB and BC combinations described above, the second with BA and CB combinations, and the third with AC and
CA combinations.1

Fig. 2 Shape stimuli, as used by Canovas et al., used in the present study
for participants C4, C5, & C6

Note that these different combinations do not correspond to

trained relation, symmetry, and transitivity, respectively, but
are all instances of a combination of transitivity-cumequivalence as in many-to-one or comparison-as-node training structures

Psychol Rec

Staged-Desynchronization Test
Since participants performance was followed individually as
the experiment progressed, it was noted that C4 had not transferred from reasonable performance on the compound tests to
mastery of the final MTS test, unlike C1 and C2. In the spirit
of Saunders and Greens (1999) analysis of the effects of the
kinds of discrimination involved in tests of stimulus equivalence formation in different training structures, it was felt that
a gradual transition between the compound test and the
matching-to-sample (MTS) test (described below) would
maximize the chances of demonstrating stimulus equivalence
relations in these two mutually confirmatory ways. The
staged-desynchronization test was therefore added for the remaining two participants in this experiment (C5 and C6), and
for all participants in Experiments 2 and 3.
The staged-desynchronization test was a modification of
the compound test in which, over the four test blocks, the
onset of the right hand stimulus was made to occur at increasing intervals of 500 ms, 1000 ms, 1500 ms, and 2000 ms after
the onset of the left hand stimulus, so that on the last test block
the left stimulus ended as the right began, a zero-delay procedure. The instructions were as follows:
SEPARATING STIMULI TEST
Just as before, you should respond on the C key to pairs
of stimuli you think are correct and respond on the N
key to pairs you think are not correct.
Now however, on successive blocks of trials, the onset
of the two stimuli will be staggered, until the first one on
the left terminates before the second one on the right
comes on.
Respond in the presence of the second stimulus.
Two-Choice Matching-to-Sample Test A conventional
MTS test was finally given in which the single left hand
Bsample^ stimulus was followed after a zero delay by a choice
between two comparison stimuli, one on the left and one on
the right of the screen. The instructions were:
In this test, on each trial, you will first be shown a single
stimulus, followed by a choice of two stimuli. You should
choose one of these two by pressing the C key for the one
on the left or the M key for the one on the right.
There is no feedback in this test.
Please carry on over a series of test blocks.
Debriefing After the key-pressing tests, participants were
given an individual debriefing, including a drawing test of
the free recall of the stimuli and their associated keys, together
with a report on their performance, including their interpretations of instructions and hypotheses. These conversations
were all voice recorded and a few items from the

conversations that seemingly throw light on participants objective behaviour are described below.
Results
All six participants (C16) in initial training (column 2 of
Table 1) reached the criterion of perfect performance on two
successive blocks of 12 trials, which required a total number
of 12-trial blocks varying from 6 to 13. The number of trials
correct for successive blocks are listed with the total number
of blocks in brackets.
Column 3 in Table 1 similarly indicates (some details not
available for C1 and C22) progress in learning the new responses to A1 and A2, and column 4 shows the course of
the unreinforced progress to criterion on the transfer-offunction of these new responses to the remaining stimuli.
Five out of six participants (C1, C2, C4, C5, and C6)
passed the transfer-of-function test, though C5 and C6 failed
this the first time round and were required to restart with the
initial discrimination training.
C3 transferred imperfectly (last two blocks 10/12 and 9/12
correct), and failed compound tests and MTS. He should have
been run to perfection on transfer-of-function or restarted (despite having learned the initial discrimination quickly first
time around).
C4, although he transferred successfully on his first eight
12-trial blocks, was erroneously given 14 further blocks in
which performance fell off dramatically to chance or below.
Although he performed well on the compound tests, he failed
the MTS test, probably explained by his adoption of a strange
algorithm during this test, as described below.
The number of responses correct out of 16 in each of the
four test blocks in the three compound tests are shown in
Table 1, columns 5, 6, and 7. Participants C1, C2, C5 and
C6 reached an accuracy of 16/16 and C4 15/16 by the end
of these tests. Column 8 shows the near-perfect scores obtained by C5 and C6, the only participants given the extra stageddesynchronization test.
Column 9 shows the number of responses correct /12 for
successive matching-to-sample test blocks, which were given
until a criterion of 12/12 correct was reached (participants C1,
C2, C5, and C6) or showed no prospect of being reached (C3
and C4). Debriefing, however, revealed that C2 had used a
confounding shape difference, Brounded^ versus Bangular^,
between the two sets of stimuli (see Fig. 1a) as the basis for
her MTS performance. This is why the A1 and A2 stimuli
were interchanged (Fig. 1b) for participant C3, who ironically
deployed the same binary shape discrimination, thus
2

A programming error prevented computer recording of these

participants choices, but they were also directly observed by
the experimenter and clearly seen to master the new key responses to the A1 and A2 stimuli

11, 12
16, 16, 16, 14
11, 16, 13, 15

13, 15, 16, 15

12, 16,16, 16

10, 11, 11,12

15, 15, 15, 15
6, 13, 7, 8

11, 9, 15, 12

13, 15,9, 16

11, 12
6, 5, 4, 4, 4, 4, 4, 5, 4, 4
6, 5, 4, 5,8, 8, 8, 5, 6
Not given
Not given
Not given

Debriefings

(b) 12, 12
(b) 9, 10, 11, 11, 12, 11, 12 (7)

C6

(a) 11, 8, 11, 12, 12

(b) 10, 11, 9,10, 12, 12
C5

5 runs + 4 trials
9, 12, 12
6 runs + 1 trial
C2
C3
C4

C1

12, 12, ??

(a) 5, 6, 11, 10, 7, 12, 12

11, 12, 12
3, 2, 4, 5, 5,5, 4, 3, 5, 6, 8, 10, 9
11, 11, 11, 12, 10, 12, 11, 12, 2, 1,
3, 8, 2, 1, 6, 4, 1, 5, 3, 4, 0, 6
(a) 6, 9, 2, 8, 9, 8, 5, 4, 7, 5, 6
(b) 10, 9, 6, 0, 0, 3, 4, 3, 3, 3, 5, 0,
0, 0, 12,8, 11, 12
(a) 5, 7, 6, 6, 5, 8, 6, 6, 8, 9, 6, 6,
7, 7,
(b) 8, 12, 12

16, 16, 15, 14

4, 8, 8, 7
10, 8, 12, 13

16, 16, 15, 16

8, 7, 8, 8
14, 14, 10, 11

16, 16,15, 16
0, 1, 0, 3
10, 15,11, 15,

5, 8, 12
Not given

incorrectly interchanging these two stimuli. This was why the

original stimuli used by Canovas et al. (Fig. 2) were adopted
for the remaining three participants in Experiment 1. Even
then, shape resemblances had an influence: C4, in debriefing,
allocated the stimuli to three rather than two groups: A1 and
A2, B1 and B2, and C1 and C2.

4, 3, 8, 6, 5, 8, 8, 10, 10, 11,

12, 12 (12)
9, 11, 10, 10, 10, 12, 12 (7)
6, 11, 10, 11, 12, 12 (6)
5, 2, 9, 8, 9, 9, 10, 10, 10,
11, 11, 12, 12 (13)
(a) 5, 5, 4, 6, 9, 11, ?
(b) 7, 6, 6, 7, 9, 9, 6, 10, 12,
12 (10)
(a) 6, 6, 11, 10, 7, 12, 12 (7)

12, 12

8, 8, 15, 10,

14, 16, 16, 15

14, 14,14, 16

MTS /12
Train 2 /12
Train 1 /12

Table 1

Correct responses per trial block in Experiment 1

Transfer-of-function /12

Compound
AB/BC /16

Compound
BA/CB /16

Compound
AC/CA /16

Desync
AC/CA /16

Psychol Rec

Different accounts were given by participants of the transfer-offunction test. C1 was fully aware of the transfer of keys from M
to G and from K to B, implying a rule to apply in this test, but
C2 seemed unaware of how she did this, though both participants showed virtually perfect and immediate transfer. C6 on
her second time round, on the basis of the shapes of the stimuli
(Fig. 2), conceptualized the lower row as Bpattern shapes^ and
the upper row as Bplain shapes^, which informed her transferof-function performance as well as that on subsequent tests.
On the compound test, participants C1, C4, and probably
C5 similarly used Bsame^ keys versus Bdifferent^ keys as the
basis for Bcorrect^ and Bincorrect^ pairs, in line with the experimenters expectations. However, the other participants
were more concerned with stimulus shapes. C2 divided the
stimuli into Bangular^ versus Bround^, which by inspection of
Fig 1a can be seen to be confounded with the experimenters
allocations. Her use of this meant that her apparent equivalence performances may be seen instead as systematic shape
discriminations. This confound was rectified by interchanging
A1 and A2 so that the next participant, C3, was given the
allocations in Fig. 1b. He, ironically, used the same shape
dichotomy as C2, which in the compound trials would make
all tests systematically wrong, except for BC and CB pairings,
which meshed exactly with his performance on the first two
compound tests, and in the MTS test. For participants C4C6,
the shape stimuli in Fig. 2, identical with those used by
Canovas et al., were substituted for those in Fig. 1. In Fig. 2,
the reader may agree, any inherent resemblances are between
the pairs of stimuli in each of the columns, which are orthogonal to the putative equivalence groupings (the rows). The
further irony was that this was exactly how C4 reported he
grouped the stimuli on post-experimental recall of the shapes,
despite correctly assigning their associated key presses.
Seemingly, he used key responses successfully in the first
eight blocks of transfer-of-function trials, but as by then he
was not informed that he had passed this test or moved on to
the next test, he seemingly switched to a different hypothesis
to guide his subsequent choices. He reported that for MTS,
this was the seemingly unparsimonious rule, entirely at odds
with equivalence, that if the pair of stimuli on the present trial
was a repeat of the previous trial respond C, but if they were
different, respond M. The record shows that most of his rare C
responses were consistent with this infrequent contingency.

Psychol Rec

A final point of interest was the account participant C1

gave of her objectively faultless performance on the MTS test.
She reported that she attended only to the stimuli on the left of
the screen, first the sample, and then the comparison on the
left. If these had both been allocated the same keys, she
responded Bsame^, otherwise Bdifferent^. Given only two
comparisons, she was able to transfer this parsimonious rule
from the compound test to the MTS test.
All six participants correctly drew the shape stimuli they had
been given from memory. These were grouped correctly and
were given the correct key allocations by participants C1, C5,
and C6. They were grouped in three rows C2B2, B1C1, and
A1B1 and without labels by participant C2, and in two rows
corresponding to Fig. 1a by C3, who had been trained on
Fig. 1b, displaying the dominance of shape resemblances. C3
also allocated the stimuli to three disparate combinations of keys:
2 MB, 2 KG, and 2 KB. Participant C4 allocated keys correctly,
but grouped the stimuli into three pairs, C2C1, B2B1, and A2A1.
Discussion
Only four or marginally five out of the six participants
achieved equivalence as assessed by the compound tests,
and only four of these fulfilled the technical criteria of equivalence in the additional MTS test, at least one of whom probably achieved this by the application of a rule not attributable
to equivalence relations, but to adventitious similarities between the stimuli. Nevertheless, it was felt that the positive
results of Canovas et al. had been sufficiently well replicated
to proceed with the two following experiments, which incorporated a number of procedural changes.
From here on, in place of shape stimuli, phonologically
correct non-words (hereinafter words), as shown in Fig. 3,
were used as sample stimuli, and, in place of the key-press
responses to the samples, further words were used, which the
participants were required to learn to say aloud before they
subsequently appeared on the screen as informational feedback.
If, and only if, the correct word had been said in advance, the
participant was required to self score a correct response (which
could be retrospectively checked from voice recordings).

Experiment 2
Participants Four more psychology undergraduate participants, C710, aged 1819 years, from the same source as
those in Experiment 1.
Stimuli Ten 4-letter phonologically correct non-words, as
shown in Fig. 3a.
Discrimination Training This was given in the same way as
in Experiment 1, except that the word stimuli A1, B1, C1 and

Fig. 3 Phonologically correct non-words used as printed sample stimuli

(columns A, B, and C) and as spoken responses (columns X and Y), (a) in
Experiment 2, and (b) in Experiment 3

A2, B2, C2 were given instead of shapes, and saying

words X1 and X2 aloud were the required responses instead of key presses, with feedback showing the written
correct X1 or X2 word after the vocal anticipatory response had been made.
New Response Training and Transfer-of-Function
Testing For participants C7, C8, and C9, the new responses
of saying aloud stimuli Y1 and Y2, with similar feedback,
were substituted for saying X1 or X2 to stimuli A1 and A2,
and transfer-of-training training to B1, C1 and B2, C2 was
given in the same way as in Experiment 1; that is, in the
absence of visual feedback. For participant C10, these
retraining and transfer-of-training phases were omitted.
Compound Tests Three blocks each of 16 trials were given
as in Experiment 1, followed in all cases by a stageddesynchronization test.
Matching-to-Sample Test This was given to all participants as in Experiment 1 with repeated trial blocks until
the criterion of 12/12 trials correct was reached, except
in the case of participant C9, who was only given eight
blocks of trials since she showed no signs of above
chance responding.
Debriefing Participants were questioned after the final
MTS test in the same way as in Experiment 1, and
were also given a recognition and sorting test in which
participants were confronted by an empty table of five
columns and seven rows, surrounded by a random array
of the ten words used in the experiment plus eight other
words that had not been used. They were instructed to
click on and drag the words that they remembered had
been used into separate cells in the table, putting them
into some kind of order. Figure 4 shows participant
C7s response to this, as an example.

C9

C8

9, 9, 10, 9, 6, 9, 10, 12
12, 14, 12, 14.
7, 13, 9, 11
10, 10, 9, 8
8, 7, 9, 11
omitted
0, 0, 2, 1, 3, 4, 3, 4, 5, 4, 5, 4, 5, 6, 6,
4, 2, 4, 6, 5, 5, 6, 6, 5, 4, 5, 5, 5,
5, 5, 5, 6, 6, 6, 6 (35)
C10

(b) 6, 4, 4, 6
(b) 12, 4, 5, 7
(b) 10, 9, 10, 10
(b) 1, 4, 3, 4, 5, 4, 3, 5,
5, 4, 4, 4, 5, 5, 5, 5,
5, 5, 4
(b) 1, 3, 4, 5, 6, 6, 6, 6

(b) 8, 9, 8, 9

(a) not given

(a) not given

(a) 4, 3,10, 7

(a) 7, 6, 5, 9

(a) 8, 6, 3, 1

(a) not given

6, 3, 1, 8, 5, 3, 5, 6

11, 8, 9, 8, 8, 4, 6, 11, 11,

10, 10, 7, 8, 9, 10, 11,
11, 10, 10, 12
14, 12, 12, 13
7, 7, 9, 14
13, 12, 15, 12
10, 8, 12, 13
1, 6, 6, 6, 6
2, 5, 6, 6, 5, 6, 5, 6, 4, 6,
5, 6, 6, 5, 6, 6, 6, 6

10, 12
14, 14, 15, 16
9, 11, 12, 10
7, 10, 13, 10
3, 4, 4, 6
0, 4, 0, 4,5, 4, 5, 1, 1,
0,1, 0, 2, 6, 6, 6, 6
3, 6, 6, 6, 6

Transfer-of-function /6
Train 2 /6
Train 1 /6 criterion 24/24 correct

Correct responses per trial block in Experiment 2

Table 2

All four participants (C710) in initial training (column 2 of

Table 2) reached the 24/24 correct criterion (perfect performance on four successive blocks of six trials), which required
a total number of blocks varying from 29 to 52. The number of
trials correct for successive blocks are listed with the total
number of blocks in brackets. A less rigorous criterion of
(say) 11/12 correct would have required far fewer blocks to
have been achieved in most cases.
Training to two new vocalized words was only initially
given to participants C7 and C8, which they learned for two
stimuli (column 3) and transferred successfully to the other
four stimuli (column 4). These two participants then performed rather poorly on the four compound stimulus tests
(columns 58), with only C7 reaching perfect 16/16 correct
performance on the last block of the fourth (stageddesynchronization) test. Both, however, reached the criterion
of 12/12 correct on the final MTS test (column 9).
Participant C9 was initially not given the new response and
transfer-of-function tests, and was taken straight to the first three
compound tests. Performance on these did not transcend chance,
and deteriorated so far that she was returned [row (b)] to initial
training, followed by training to new vocal responses. Transferof-function of these was less than perfect, and her subsequent
performance on the repeated compound tests was at first much
improved, but deteriorated to chance levels on the last three
blocks of test 3 and all four blocks of the stageddesynchronization test. On the final MTS test, C9s performance
was at chance level over the eight test blocks she was given.
For participant C10, transfer-of-function training was also
omitted, and in his case there was progressive improvement
on the compound tests. He attained the criterion of 12/12
correct on MTS on the eighth test block.

Compound
AB/BC /16

Results

0, 2, 2, 6, 0, 2, 5, 6, 1, 4, 4, 4, 5, 6,0,
3, 4, 5, 6, 1, 6, 1, 5, 4, 4, 6, 3, 5,6, 3,
4, 5, 6, 3, 6, 5, 5, 5, 6, 5, 6, 6,6, 5, 5,
6, 5, 6, 6, 6, 6, 6 (52)
0, 0, 0, 0, 0, 3, 5, 5, 3, 6, 5, 5, 6, 5,6, 5,
5, 6, 6, 6, 5, 6, 5, 6, 6, 5, 5, 5,6, 5,
6, 6, 6, 6 (34)
(a) 0, 0, 0, 0, 2, 3, 5, 4, 3, 5, 5, 4,3, 5,
6, 3, 5, 5, 5, 4, 4, 5, 3, 6, 5,6, 6,
6, 6 (29)
(b) 6, 6, 6, 5, 6, 6, 6, 6 (8)

Compound
BA/CB /16

Fig. 4 Recognition and sorting test - an example of one participants

selection and arrangement of the stimuli (all the words were presented
initially in random array around the margins of the matrix: see text for
details)

C7

Compound
AC/CA /16

Desynch
AC/CA /16

MTS /12
criterion 12/12

Psychol Rec

Psychol Rec

Debriefing The three participants who performed above

chance on the compound tests and satisfied the criterion on
MTS were able to give a clear account of the basis of their
choices, the grouping together of words that had been linked
to the same Bpair words^ or Bending words^, that is, the vocalized comparison words. Only participant C8 was able to
recall the stimuli verbally, but all three distinguished them
from the unused words and grouped them correctly in the
sorting test.
Participant C9 described a different principle which
had guided her choices in the compound and MTS tests,
of some kind of Bopposition in sound of the words^,
which was hard to understand and was evidently unrelated to the formation of linkages compatible with stimulus
equivalence.

training to a second set of vocal responses, nor a transfer-oftraining phase.

Compound Tests Participant C11 was only given a single
compound test before the final MTS test, but the remaining
participants (C1215) were given three compound tests, each
of which included a balanced mixture of AB, BA, AC, CA,
BC and CB dyads, all of which can be taken as tests of equivalence, followed by a similar fourth test incorporating a
phased desynchronization of the stimuli.
MTS Tests All participants were given a final series of MTS
tests.Finally, debriefings and sorting tests were conducted as
in Experiment 2.
Results (see Table 3)

Discussion
Substitution of words for both visual stimuli and vocalized responses seemed to have made initial learning harder and performance on the compound tests less accurate if the two small
groups of participants in Experiments 1 and 2 are compared.
Initially omitting the training to new responses and the
transfer-of-function tests may have made the compound tests
harder for participant C9, though she performed poorly on the
transfer-of-function tests when retrained, and did little better on
the compound tests, failing the MTS tests completely. A similar
by-passing of the stages for setting up functional equivalence
classes had less discernible effect on participant C10s performance on the compound tests, which improved, especially on
the last staged-desynchronization test, and he attained the criterion of equivalence class formation on the MTS test.
It was tentatively concluded that the Bsimple discrimination
training^ procedure alone might well be sufficient to establish
stimulus equivalence relations in most participants. This conjecture was tested further in Experiment 3, which included the
additional demand of a third potential equivalence class, using
non-words again as stimuli.

Experiment 3
Participants Five more psychology undergraduate participants, C1115, from the same source as those in
Experiments 1 and 2, aged 1820 years.
Stimuli Twelve 4-letter phonologically correct non-words, as
shown in Fig. 3(b).
Discrimination Training The number of discriminative
stimuli (Fig. 3(b) columns A, B, and C) was increased to nine,
with three vocal response stimuli (column X), giving three
potential three-member equivalence classes. There was no

Participant C11 only received one compound test, on which

he performed no better than chance, but he nevertheless
reached the criterion of equivalence with a strong performance
over seven test blocks.
Participants C1215 were given three compound tests, over
which they showed increasing accuracy, and all attained the
criterion score of 12/12 correct responses on the MTS test of
equivalence.
Debriefing Participant C11 well understood that it was the
presence or absence of a shared Bkey word^correctly
recalled as Byeen, zurl, twip^ that determined his choices in
the brief compound test and the MTS, and though he only
imperfectly recalled four or five of the other stimulus words,
he grouped the stimuli perfectly in the sorting test. C12 fully
understood the principle of shared or unshared comparison
stimuli, and was able to recall all the stimuli and their interrelations verbally, except for one stimulus word, and performed
perfectly on the sorting test. She reported forming compounds
of the non-words and their resemblance to real words such as
Bdowf-yeen^ = Bdownstream^, Bfrob-yeen^ = Bthrobbing^,
Bbrez-zurl^ = Bbrazil^.
Participant C13 gave a completely clear explanation of the
principles of the tests, but was only able to recall five of the
stimuli verbally. Her sort was perfect, however. Participant
C14 similarly understood the principles and saw three groups.
She promptly recalled 11/12 words and sorted them perfectly.
She could visualize the two words as one in her head, noting
certain patterns of letters, but without meaning. Participant
C15 became convinced, after many MTS test blocks that he
had performed perfectly (unless he had remembered one
pairing incorrectly). From the behavioural record, it can be
seen that this was indeed the case, but he eventually figured
out which one this was, corrected it, and reached criterion (and
exonerated the computer!). In a clear explanation of how he
correctly used the sample-comparison links to guide his

Psychol Rec
Table 3

C11

C12
C13

C14

C15

Correct responses per trial block in Experiment 3

Train 1/9 criterion 25/27 correct

Compound /12

1, 2, 2, 5, 2, 1, 0, 1, 4, 6, 4, 3, 4,
5, 4, 3, 6, 6, 5, 3, 4, 6, 6, 6, 4, 6,
8, 7, 9, 6, 7, 7, 7, 8, 8, 7, 8, 6,
9, 7, 9, 6, 8, 8, 9, 9, 8 (47)
1, 2, 5, 4, 4, 5, 5, 5, 7, 8, 8, 9, 9,
8 (14)
0, 6, 1, 2, 3, 4, 3, 5, 6, 5, 6, 5, 5,
6, 6, 5, 7, 5, 7, 7, 6, 6, 9, 8,
7, 9, 9, 7 (28)
0, 0, 3, 3, 2, 2, 4, 1, 3, 4, 3, 2, 6,
7, 3, 5, 4, 4, 5, 4, 7, 8, 6, 7, 7,
6, 6, 9, 8, 8, 9, 5, 7, 8, 8, 8,
9, 8, 9, 9, 8 (41)
0, 4, 4, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 4, 5, 4, 6, 4,
5, 7, 7, 7, 7, 8, 8, 9, 9, 8 (23)

8, 8, 3, 7

All dyads /18

All dyads /18

All dyads desynch. /18

MTS/12
8, 10, 7, 11, 11, 11, 12

9, 5, 8, 9

13, 17, 16, 13

17, 18, 18, 17

12 rpt: 12

14, 14, 13, 9

13, 12, 13, 12

11, 12, 13, 12

9, 10, 10, 11, 10, 10, 11, 8,

9, 12

9, 8, 11, 10

11, 12, 13, 13

14, 17, 14, 17

10, 12 rpt: 11, 11, 11, 12

6, 7, 11, 13

10, 16, 12, 11

15, 14, 16, 14

10, 9, 9, 9, 9, 7, 9, 7, 9, 9,
9, 10, 9, 9, 10, 9, 12

responses, he actually used the word Bequivalent^ and later

revealed he was familiar with this concept in his mathematics
and computer science education. He recalled 11/12 of the
words in correct groupings and performed perfectly on the
sorting test. he said his method of remembering connections
between stimuli involved primarily phonetic properties of the
words, not meanings.
Discussion
Judged by the criterion of correct responding on the MTS
tests, all five participants formed three equivalence classes,
but although the level of performance over the preceding compound test blocks only occasionally reached 17 or 18/18 correct for participants C1215, one cannot be sure whether or
not these prior tests prepared participants in some way for the
multiple choice task. For participant C11, who only had one
set of four 12-trial blocks of compound tests, on which he
performed no better than chance, this can hardly be the case.
These results, however, confirm that the initial training, without further training to alternative vocalization
responses or demonstration of functional equivalence relations between the sample stimuli, was sufficient to
establish three 3-member equivalence classes in parallel
in 5/5 participants.

General Discussion
In Canovas et al.s study, the initial Bsimple discrimination^
training (discussed below) was followed by a demonstration
of the formation of functional equivalence classes before applying the compound test which gave evidence of stimulus equivalence relations between the stimuli within each class. All four
of their participants performed almost perfectly on all tests.

There are a number of procedural differences between

Canovas et al.s (2014), Experiment 2 and Experiment 1 in
the present study, largely due to the adaptation for the latter of
software designed for other experiments (see e.g., Dickins and
Ozolins 2011). The main one was the use of informational
feedbackshowing the correct key label (or printed nonsense
word) that should have been selectedrather than awarding
credit points or a similar reinforcer. Comparing performances
of participants in the two laboratories: on initial training they
were similar, though two of the present participants required
fewer trials to reach the same criterion. Training a new key
response to A1 and A2 took a similar number of trials to reach
the same criterion. Transfer-of-function, which was near perfect
for Canovas et al., was similarly quick for three participants
(C1, C2 and C4), but two others required restarting from the
beginning, one (C6) being quick the second time round, but the
other (C5) taking 18 blocks of 12 trials to reach criterion. The
remaining (sixth) participant (C3) should be discounted, since
he was given 13 trial blocks but did not achieve the criterion
and should have been retrained. (He was taken directly to the
compound and the MTS tests, on both of which he performed
well below chance.) C4, having reached criterion, was erroneously given further transfer-of-function trials on which performance dropped to below chance levels, and though he performed better than chance on the compound tests, he did not
attain criterion on the MTS test. On the compound tests in the
present study, four participants (C1, C2, C5, and C6) reached
16/16 correct after varying numbers of trial blocks, whereas all
four of the Canovas et al.s participants were perfect or near
perfect from the start. Whether this is due to the addition of a
definitive response for Bincorrect^ pairs as well as a different
response for Bcorrect^ pairs cannot be determined. These detailed differences notwithstanding Experiment 1 may be seen to
provide a fair, although not exact, replication of the findings of
Canovas et al.

Psychol Rec

Did the transfer-of-function test given by Canovas et al.

generate functional equivalence between the three stimuli in
each class that subsequently supported the stimulus equivalence (SE) relations between them demonstrated by the compound tests? Or did the initial training itself generate SE relations that manifested themselves on both the tests of functional
equivalence and of stimulus equivalence? Two of the four
participants in Experiment 2, and all five participants in
Experiment 3 were not given the transfer tests, but proceeded
from initial training straight to the compound tests. All except
one passed the final MTS tests. The exception was C9, who
gave only chance performance on her first set of compound
tests. She therefore received repeat initial training and this
time was given the transfer tests, on which she repetitively
ceilinged on 5/6 trials correct. Her performance on the compound tests was little better the second time around and she
completely failed the subsequent MTS test.
In the remaining participants, successful establishment of
functional classes was found not to be necessary for subsequent performance on the compound or MTS tests of equivalence. All six participants (C1015) for whom this stage was
omitted reached the 12/12 responses correct criterion on the
MTS test, though their best performance on the compound
tests varied (see Table 4). (Interestingly, one (C11) was only
given a single set of four blocks of compound trials on which
he performed at chance level, but he still passed the subsequent MTS test.) Whether prior exposure to the compound
tests in general promoted the emergence of MTS equivalence
responding cannot be determined in this study, especially
since the phased-desynchronization test, given to all but the
first four participants (C1C4), was designed to scaffold transfer from a simultaneous to a successive discrimination.

Table 4 Participants
performances on the three tests

An alternative way to look at the initial training of all participants on what Canovas et al. termed a Bsimple discrimination training procedure^ is that this constituted a Bmany-toone^ (MTO) or Bcomparison-as-node^ matching-to-sample
procedure: each of the sample stimuli can be seen as a conditional stimulus governing a discrimination between two or
three comparisons. In the case of key pressing, these comparisons are the keys themselves, already present, and already
specified in the instructions, which need to be visually and/or
proprioceptively distinguished, before one is pressed. This can
be seen as a simultaneous discrimination. In the case of the
vocal responses in the present study, anticipation was required. Prior to the response, the words were not physically
present, and had to be retrieved from a remembered array. This
array is not specified in advance, but only starts to build when
the early sample-comparison pairings are presented.
Participants soon presumably discern that the number of
words to be discriminated between is only two (in
Experiment 2), or three (in Experiment 3). The subsequent
appearance of the correct word, after the vocal response therefore served both as a determinant and a confirmation of the
response, like the presentation of the correct letter after the key
presses in the present study.
An interesting feature of these experiments is that, by being
attached to their three-sample stimuli, the non-words seemingly fulfill the role of Bnames^ in the theoretical account of
equivalence class formation set out by Horne and Lowe
(1996). Now there is evidence that equivalence class formation may take place more quickly and readily with stimuli that
are easy to name, such as icons representing familiar signs or
objects, compared with Babstract^ letter-like symbols taken
from esoteric languages or that are just made up (Bentall

Participant

Generalization test:Passed ,
failed X, Not given

Compound test:Best score

MTS test:Best score

C1
C2
C3
C4
C5
C6
C7

X
X
X
X

16/16
16/16
8/16
15/16
16/16
16/16
16/16

12
12
6
8
12
12
12

C8
C9
C10
C11
C12
C13
C14
C15

15/16
12/16
14/16
8/18
18/18
14/18
17/18
16/18

12
8
12
12
12
12
12
12

Psychol Rec

et al. 1993). When these authors taught participants individual

names for Babstract^ stimuli, however, there was little improvement in equivalence class formation, whereas when a
common name was taught to all members of each potential
class of abstract stimuli, equivalence relations were rapidly
established, and without the distinction normally found between nodal relations (transitivity or equivalence) and nonnodal relations (trained relations and symmetry) of lower accuracy and longer reaction times when nodes are involved
(Bentall et al. 1993, 1999) . One might expect in general an
absence or attenuation of such differences following MTO
compared with linear training structures: it is possible that any
item fulfilling the role of common comparison in such structures, whether it is a vocalized Bname^, or just another visual
stimulus, or a specific action, such as pressing a particular key,
will have similar effects. Unfortunately, in the present study,
there were no non-nodal relations that could be compared with
the nodal ones in either the compound or the MTS tests.
These considerations bear on the key properties of
Bnaming^, which it has been proposed (Horne and Lowe
1996, 1997) may be a necessary and not just a sufficient
prerequisite for equivalence class formation. A naturally
nameable stimulus is one that has meaning, in some sense of
this complex concept. One behavioural analytic approach to
meaning is exemplified in recent work by Fields et al. (2012)
and Arntzen et al. (2014), which indicated that establishing
one otherwise abstract stimulus as a discriminative stimulus,
governing some other unrelated response, in each training
class of five such stimuli made it much more likely that all
five would form equivalence classes. This was in a context of
linear training, and using the simultaneous protocol (all possible trained relations taught at the same time), in which the
usual yield of equivalence class formation with all abstract
stimuli was very low. Such discrimination training boosted
this yield in the same directionthough to a lesser extent
as did the use of a meaningful picture as one of the stimuli in
each training class, along with four abstract items.
If it were found to be the case that an attachment to any
operant, not only a vocalization, can help weld a bunch of
arbitrary stimuli together into functional equivalence and stimulus equivalence classes, this would not necessarily undermine
the intuitive resemblances that equivalence relations have with
symbolic language (e.g. Place 1995; Dickins and Dickins
2001). Signing, demonstrable early in human ontogeny (though
its developmental significance here is questionable (Kirk et al.
2013; Fitzpatrick et al. 2014), and often accorded an important
speculative role in the phylogeny of language (Corballis 1992),
may well be an example of just such an operant.

Ethical Statement This study, like all studies administered by the

School of Psychology Research Participation Scheme, was scrutinized

by and received the approval of the University of Liverpool Committee

on Research Ethics.

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