RESPONSE ACQUISITION BY SIAMESE FIGHTING FISH (BETTA SPLENDENS) WITH DELAYED VISUAL REINFORCEMENT

Male Siamese fighting fish, Betta splendens, swam through a ring in an aquarium, breaking a photocell beam and initiating an unsignaled, res etting delay interval. Following delays of 0 s, 10 s, or 25 s, a 15-s mirror presentation released an aggressive display by the fish. Swimmi ng through the ring increased in the absence of either a period of acc limatization to the reinforcer (analogous to magazine training when ap petitive reinforcers are used) or explicit training of the response by the experimenters. Response rates were a decreasing function of delay duration. Other fish exposed to a schedule of response-independent mi rror presentations failed to acquire and maintain the response. The re sults demonstrate the robustness and generality of the phenomenon of r esponse acquisition with delayed reinforcement. They further qualify e arlier observations about behavioral mechanisms involved in the phenom enon.