Punishment of schedule-induced drinking in rats by signaled and unsignaled delays in food presentation.
A short, signaled delay to the next reinforcer reliably cuts schedule-induced drinking in rats.
01Research in Context
What this study did
Paul et al. (1987) worked with rats that drank too much water between food pellets. The rats lived on a fixed-time food schedule. Every sip triggered a delay in the next pellet. Half the rats got a tone before the delay. The other half got no warning. The team used an ABAB reversal design to be sure any drop in drinking was caused by the delay.
They compared each punished rat to a yoked partner. The partner got the same delay pattern but drinking had no effect on food timing.
What they found
Both signaled and unsignaled delays cut schedule-induced drinking below control levels. The signaled group drank the least. When delays were removed, drinking bounced back. When delays returned, drinking dropped again. The pattern proved the delay acted as punishment, not mere suppression.
How this fits with other research
Macdonald (1973) showed that a warning tone makes electric-shock punishment less harsh. Paul et al. (1987) now find the same benefit with food delays instead of shocks. The two studies line up: signals soften punishment across very different aversive events.
Hymowitz (1981) looked murkier. That team also used signaled versus unsignaled punishment of schedule-induced licking, but shock intensity and body weight muddied the picture. Sometimes the signal helped, sometimes not. Paul et al. (1987) kept shock out and held weight constant, giving a cleaner test that favors the signal.
Morris et al. (1982) argued schedule-induced drinking is not elicited by food cues; it emerges from competition among motivated behaviors. Paul et al. (1987) accept that view and go further: if drinking is just another behavior in the mix, it can be punished like any other response.
Why it matters
You now have lab proof that a brief, response-dependent delay can punish adjunctive behavior, and a simple signal makes the delay work better. When you must use punishment with a client, pair the consequence with a clear warning stimulus and keep the delay short and contingent. The rat data say you will get faster, cleaner suppression with less emotional fallout.
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02At a glance
03Original abstract
Food-deprived rats were exposed to a fixed-time 60-s schedule of food-pellet presentation and developed schedule-induced drinking. Using an ABA reversal design, three experiments investigated the effects of events then made dependent on licks. In Experiment 1, lick-dependent signaled delays (10 s) in food presentation in general led to decreased drinking, which recovered when the signaled delays were discontinued. The drinking of yoked-control rats, which received food at the same times as those exposed to the signaled-delay contingency, showed much smaller changes. Experiment 2 showed that 10-s lick-dependent signals alone did not reduce drinking. In Experiment 3, when licks produced unsignaled 10-s delays in food there were less marked and more gradual changes in drinking than in Experiment 1, although these effects again were greater than with yoked-control animals. We concluded that both signaled and unsignaled delays functioned as punishers of drinking. These findings support the view that schedule-induced drinking, like operant behavior, is subject to control by its consequences.
Journal of the experimental analysis of behavior, 1987 · doi:10.1901/jeab.1987.48-417