Correspondence as conditional stimulus control: Insights from experiments with pigeons

Correspondence between saying and doing, typically studied in young childre n and individuals with developmental disabilities, was examined as an : Ins tance of conditional stimulus control. In Experiment 1, 3 pigeons were expo sed to a two-component repeated-trials procedure. In the first-sample or sa y-component, two response keys transilluminated by different colored lights were presented and the pigeon pecked one of the keys. After 1 s of darknes s in the chamber, the second-choice or do-component was presented, in which the two keys again were transilluminated, one by the color selected in the first component and the second by another color. Selecting the color that matched that selected in the say component resulted in access to food. Sele cting the other color produced a blackout of the chamber. After an intertri al interval (ITI), the next say component was programmed, and the procedure was repeated. Correspondence remained at chance levels through several man ipulations of ITI duration and sample response requirement. When a correcti on procedure was added such that only the originally selected sample stimul us was re-presented until a correct choice response occurred, reliable corr espondence developed in 2 pigeons. This correspondence was eliminated by ma king reinforcement independent of correspondence and subsequently was reest ablished when reinforcement again depended on correspondence. in Experiment 2, 3 other pigeons rapidly acquired correspondence under the final procedu re used in Experiment 1. Increasing the time interval between the sav and d o components diminished correspondence. The results of the two experiments suggest how correspondence may be considered an instance of conditional sti mulus control and that it is possible to construct a homologue of human say -do correspondence with pigeons.