ABSTRACT
The reappearance of a response previously extinguished when an alternative response no longer produces reinforcers is called resurgence. The effects of three variables on the reappearance of response sequences - sequence probability (high and low), context of test (extinction and operant variation) and number of responses per sequence (three and five responses) - were investigated. Sequences with high probability reappeared more often than sequences with low probability, the reappearance of the target sequence was more frequent under extinction than under variation, and the reappearance of the target sequence varied inversely with the number of responses by sequence. The reappearance of the target sequence was not conceptualized as resurgence because its frequency was lower than that of the control sequences.
Keywords:
resurgence; sequence probability; context of test; number of responses per sequence; humans
