Individual differences in the severely retarded child in acquisition, stimulus generalization, and extinction in go-no-go discrimination learning

Abstract

Individual differences in severely retarded children as measured by a questionnaire were related to dependent variables measured in a discrete trial successive go-no-go intradimensional discrimination learning study that was followed by stimulus generalization tests on a hue continuum and extinction trials. Significant correlations were found between the number of intersignal responses in learning, responding to and around the nonreinforced stimulus (S−), type of errors in extinction, and the child's position on an excitation-inhibition dimension based on clinical descriptions of the behavior of the retarded given by Luria (1963).