Input coding in animal and human associative learning.
Two appetitive conditioning experiments with rats investigated whether the degree of generalization between a compound and its component parts is fixed or variable. Both experiments used a two-stage transfer design. In Stage 1, the elemental groups learned that a compound and its component parts signaled the same outcome (i.e. C+, D+, CD+), whereas the configural groups learned that a compound and its component parts signaled different outcomes (i.e. C+, D+, CD-, where '+' is pellets and '-' is no pellets). In Stage 2, the rats were tested for reductions in generalization. Experiment 1 found no evidence that past configural learning reduced generalization when a new set of alike-treated A and B elements were presented in compound for the first time. Experiment 2 found no evidence that past configural learning reduced generalization when the stimuli of Stage 1 were presented in a new C-, D-, CD+ relation. In contrast to findings with humans, these results suggest that past experience plays a minor role in how stimuli are encoded in animal conditioning.