A Transformation of Avoidance Response Functions in Accordance with Multiple Stimulus Relations

Stimuli can acquire aversive and avoidance-evoking properties by virtue of their participation in relational frames. The current paper describes two experiments on the transformation of avoidance response functions in accordance with the relational frames of coordination and opposition (Experiment 1) and comparison (Experiment 2). Following nonarbitrary pretraining and testing, subjects were exposed to a series of relational training tasks and tested for the formation of multiple stimulus relations of sameness, opposition, and more-than/less-than. Subjects were then exposed to an avoidance schedule in which one member of the relational network served as a discriminative stimulus for an avoidance response. Finally, subjects were exposed to a probe phase to assess the transformation of other members of the relational network by the avoidance functions. Subjects who showed evidence of avoidance conditioning also showed derived avoidance. The findings of the studies demonstrate the transformation of an avoidance response function in accordance with the relational frames of coordination, opposition, and comparison.