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Discrete and continuous stimulus control in the A-not-B sandbox task.

Pablo Covarrubias1, François Tonneau2

  • 1CICCC, Universidad de Guadalajara, México.

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|March 2, 2016
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Summary
This summary is machine-generated.

Stimulus control in behavior analysis appears discrete, but A-not-B sandbox tasks reveal continuous aspects. This study found continuous stimulus control in motor tasks and mixed discrete-continuous control in observational tasks, challenging prior assumptions.

Keywords:
A-not-B errorContinuityDiscretenessSandbox taskStimulus control

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Area of Science:

  • Behavior Analysis
  • Developmental Psychology
  • Cognitive Science

Background:

  • Behavior-analytic studies typically show discrete stimulus control, where responses to intermediate stimuli are mixtures of trained responses.
  • Developmental psychology theories suggest continuous spatial search in tasks like A-not-B, where children may search intermediate locations.
  • Previous A-not-B research has been ambiguous due to reliance on group means obscuring individual response distributions.

Purpose of the Study:

  • To investigate whether stimulus control in the A-not-B sandbox task is continuous or discrete.
  • To differentiate between motor and observational A-not-B procedures regarding stimulus control characteristics.
  • To reconcile findings from behavior analysis and developmental psychology on stimulus control.

Main Methods:

  • Conducted two A-not-B sandbox experiments to examine stimulus control.
  • Experiment 1 utilized a purely motor A-not-B procedure.
  • Experiment 2 employed a purely observational A-not-B procedure.

Main Results:

  • Experiment 1 demonstrated continuous stimulus control in the motor A-not-B task.
  • Experiment 2 showed that stimulus control in the observational A-not-B task was predominantly discrete but contained continuous elements.
  • Response distributions, not just group means, were analyzed to clarify stimulus control properties.

Conclusions:

  • Stimulus control in the A-not-B task can exhibit continuous properties, particularly in motor contexts.
  • Observational A-not-B tasks present a blend of discrete and continuous stimulus control.
  • Findings contribute to understanding stimulus control across different theoretical frameworks, including cognitive and behavior-analytic approaches.