Context–outcome associations mediate context-switch effects in a human predictive learning task

The impact of prolonging extinction on the ABC "super renewal" of instrumental responses in rats

Two free operant conditioning experiments with rats examined the impact of conducting a large amount of extinction training on situations that enhance the ABC renewal effect (ABC super renewal). In Experiment 1, ABC renewal was strengthened by conducting acquisition in multiple contexts. All rats were trained to press a lever for food. One group was trained in one context, while the other two groups were trained in three contexts. Then, all rats received extinction in context B. For two groups this phase lasted 4 sessions, whereas it lasted 36 sessions for the other group. In Experiment 2, ABC renewal was strengthened by using a large number of acquisition sessions. Rats were trained to perform an operant response to obtain food in context A. One group received a moderate amount of training, while the rest of the rats received a larger number of acquisition sessions. Responses underwent extinction in context B. Two groups received 4 sessions, while 36 extinction sessions were used for the remaining group. In both experiments, rats were tested in context B (extinction context) and C (renewal context). Greater ABC renewal occurred both when acquisition training was conducted in multiple contexts (Experiment 1) and by increasing the amount of acquisition training (Experiment 2). Nevertheless, we found that conducting a large number of extinction sessions reduced ABC super renewal in Experiment 1 only.

Altering Perceived Context: Transportation Cues Influence Novelty-Induced Context Exploration

Context is the milieu in which everything occurs. Many research studies consider context, or even explicitly manipulate it; yet it remains challenging to characterize. We know that a context surrounds and influences tasks; however, the boundaries of its influence are difficult to define. In behavioral science, context is often operationalized by the physical environment in which the experiment takes place, and the boundaries of the context are assumed to begin at the entrance to that of the room or apparatus. Experiences during transportation to the testing space have been shown to impact rodent behavior and memory, but transportation's relationship with novelty and physical environment is not fully understood. The current study explored how familiar vs. novel cues, both within a physical environment and preceding it, impact the perception of a context. We manipulated context on three levels: physical testing environment, object cues within that environment, and transportation cues preceding entrance to the testing environment. We found that novel transportation cues can change rats' perception of both familiar and novel contexts. The effects of transportation on perceived context may be affected by the length of the retention interval, testing environment, and behavioral range. These data suggest that context is a broad concept that includes cues across time and is sensitive to small differences in experience.

Prior extinction increases acquisition context specificity in human predictive learning

One experiment evaluated the effect of extinction on the context dependence of non-extinguished information in a situation in which physical (images), rather than predominantly verbal, contexts were used in human predictive learning. Participants received training in which different foods (Cues) were associated with the presence or the absence of gastric illness (outcome) in customers of different restaurants (contexts). One cue was associated with the gastric illness while a different cue was either extinguished or not between groups. A change in the context at test led to a general decrease in both predictive judgments and the speed of responding to the non-extinguished cue. However, these decreases were greater when training was conducted during extinction of the different cue demonstrating the extinction makes acquisition context-specific (EMACS) effect. Results are contrasted with failures to find the effect in other reports and discussed in terms of extinction leading to an allocation of attentional resources to the context, facilitating the context dependence of information.

Context dependency as a Function of Prediction Error-Based Attention

Context dependence of information has been shown to be based, at least in part, on the attention contexts received at the time of training. Recent research suggests that attention to irrelevant contexts may be a byproduct of the activation of a general exploratory attentional mechanism prompted by high prediction errors associated with situations of uncertainty. Alternatively, low prediction errors may engage an attentional mechanism of exploitation in situations in which contexts play a relevant role. A selective review discusses the potential of this approach to explain context switch effects from an attentional perspective.

Attention toward contexts modulates context-specificity of behavior in human predictive learning: Evidence from the n-back task

According to the attentional theory of context processing (ATCP), learning becomes context specific when acquired under conditions that promote attention toward contextual stimuli regardless of whether attention deployment is guided by learning experience or by other factors unrelated to learning. In one experiment with humans, we investigated whether performance in a predictive learning task can be brought under contextual control by means of a secondary task that was unrelated to predictive learning, but supposed to modulate participants' attention toward contexts. Initially, participants acquired cue-outcome relationships presented in contexts that were each composed of two elements from two dimensions. Acquisition training in the predictive learning task was combined with a one-back task that required participants to match across consecutive trials context elements belonging to one of the two dimensions. During a subsequent test, we observed that acquisition behavior in the predictive learning task was disrupted by changing the acquisition context along the dimension that was relevant for the one-back task, while there was no evidence for context specificity of predictive learning when the acquisition context was changed along the dimension that was irrelevant for the one-back task. Our results support the generality of the principles advocated by ATCP.

The Reinstatement Effect in Human Predictive Learning: Contextual Modulation and the Impact of Extinction Reminders

One of the most relevant phenomena both from a theoretical and clinical perspective is extinction. In particular, several researchers are interested in the response recovery effects from extinction. Reinstatement is an effect that has been proposed as a laboratory model to study relapse from extinction-based therapeutic treatments. We designed two experiments with humans to evaluate the reinstatement effect in a predictive learning task. In both experiments, participants learned a specific relationship between two cues (X and Y) and two outcomes (O1 and O2) during the first phase. Throughout extinction, both cues were presented without outcomes. After an exposure to the original outcomes, reinstatement of the first-learned information was observed during testing in both experiments. However, we found that the reinstatement effect was contextual modulated (Experiment 1; ηp2 = .78, 90% CI [.48, .86], p < .0001). Furthermore, in Experiment 2 we showed a reduction of reinstatement when an extinction reminder was used ηp2 = .45, 90% CI [.07, .65], p = .012. Theoretical implications are discussed, and some potential uses are mentioned.

Roles of context in acquisition of human instrumental learning: Implications for the understanding of the mechanisms underlying context-switch effects

Four experiments in human instrumental learning explored the associations involving the context that develop after three trials of training on simple discriminations. Experiments 1 and 4 found a deleterious effect of switching the learning context that cannot be explained by the context-outcome binary associations commonly used to explain context-switch effects after short training in human predictive learning and in animal Pavlovian conditioning. Evidence for context-outcome (Experiment 2), context-discriminative stimulus (Experiment 3), and context-instrumental response (Experiment 4) binary associations was found within the same training paradigm, suggesting that contexts became associated with all the elements of the situation, regardless of whether those associations played a role in a specific context-switch effect detected on performance.

Testing a cue outside the training context increases attention to the contexts and impairs performance in human predictive learning

One experiment in human predictive learning explored the impact of a context change on attention to contexts and predictive ratings controlled by the cue. In Context A: cue X was paired with an outcome four times, while cue Y was presented without an outcome four times in Context B:. In both contexts filler cues were presented without the outcome. During the test, target cues X and Y were presented either in the context where they were trained, or in the alternative context. With the context change expectation of the outcome X, expressed as predictive ratings, decreased in the presence of X and increased in the presence of Y. Looking at the contexts, expressed as a percentage of the overall gaze dwell time on a trial, was high across the four training trials, and increased with the context change. Results suggest that the presentation of unexpected information leads to increases in attention to contextual cues. Implications for contextual control of behavior are discussed.

Attention to irrelevant contexts decreases as training increases: Evidence from eye-fixations in a human predictive learning task

Participants were trained in a human predictive learning task in which they had to predict whether the ingestion of a given food (cue) by the imaginary customer of an imaginary restaurant (context) was followed by gastric malaise (outcome). One food was always followed by gastric malaise in one of the contexts, while other foods were not followed by gastric malaise in the same, or in an alternative context. Predictive responses and eye-fixations were recorded throughout the 48 training trials with each cue involved in the task. In agreement with the predictions of the Attentional Theory of Context Processing, attention to the contexts measured through eye-fixations decreased while attention to the cues increased as training progressed. The results of this study give support to the idea that contexts are actively processed at the beginning of acquisition, and that this processing decreases as training increases.

Experiencing extinction within a task makes nonextinguished information learned within a different task context-dependent

In two experiments with rats, we analyzed the effect of experiencing extinction in one task on the context specificity of a new association learned within a different task. Rats were trained to run in a runway for water in Task 1, and received taste aversion conditioning in Task 2 (the tasks were reversed in Exp. 2). Half of the rats received conditioning and extinction of Task 1 in Context A, whereas the other half received no extinction. Then all animals received training in the alternate task in Context B, prior to testing in Context C. When they were tested in Context C, Task 2 performance was attenuated if Task 1 had been extinguished prior to Task 2. These results are similar to those we have reported in humans, and consistent with the idea that extinction prompts attention to contexts, regardless of whether or not the contexts were involved in extinction.

Context change and associative learning

This article reviews the effects of changing the background context on performance in associative learning tasks in humans and animals. The findings are complementary and consistent over animal conditioning (Pavlovian and instrumental learning) and human predictive learning and memory paradigms. In many cases, a context change after learning can have surprisingly little disruptive influence on performance. Extinction, or retroactive interference treatments more generally, is more context-specific than the initial learning. Contexts become important if the participant is exposed to any of several treatments that involve prediction error, which may serve to increase attention to the context. Contexts also become important if they are given predictive or informational value. Studies of instrumental (operant) learning are further consistent with the idea that the context might also influence affordances that support voluntary actions. Context switch effects are not universal, but mainly occur when certain attention and perception processes can come into play. WIREs Cogn Sci 2013, 4:237-244. doi: 10.1002/wcs.1225 This article is categorized under: Psychology > Learning.

Mechanisms of contextual control when contexts are informative to solve the task

An experiment was conducted using a human instrumental learning task with the goal of evaluating the mechanisms underlying the deleterious effect of context-switching on responding to an unambiguous stimulus when contexts are informative to solve the task. Participants were trained in a context-based reversal discrimination in which two discriminative stimuli (X and Y) interchange their meaning across contexts A and B. In context A, discriminative stimulus Z consistently announced that the relationship between a specific instrumental response (RI) and a specific outcome (O1) was in effect. Performance in the presence of stimulus Z was equally deteriorated when the test was conducted outside the training context, regardless of whether the test context was familiar (context B) or new (context C). This result is consistent with the idea that participants code all the information presented in an informative context as context-specific with the context playing a role akin to an occasion setter.