Copyright Statement General copyright and disclaimer

Copyright Statement

The digital copy of this thesis is protected by the Copyright Act 1994 (New Zealand). This thesis may be consulted by you, provided you comply with the provisions of the Act and the following conditions of use:

• Any use you make of these documents or images must be for research or private study purposes only, and you may not make them available to any other person.

• Authors control the copyright of their thesis. You will recognise the author's right to be identified as the author of this thesis, and due acknowledgement will be made to the author where appropriate.

• You will obtain the author's permission before publishing any material from their thesis.

To request permissions please use the Feedback form on our webpage.

http://researchspace.auckland.ac.nz/feedback

General copyright and disclaimer

In addition to the above conditions, authors give their consent for the digital copy of their work to be used subject to the conditions specified on the Library Thesis Consent Form

ABSTRACT

Pigeons were t r a i n e d under concurrent c h a i n schedules i n which t h e i n i t i a l l i n k s were equal a p e r i o d i c schedules. One of t h e two t e r m i n a l l i n k s was always a f i x e d - i n t e r v a l schedule o f 1 0 sec d u r a t i o n . The o t h e r t e r m i n a l l i n k was e i t h e r a two- valued mixed-interval schedule o r

a

f i x e d - i n t e r v a l schedule.

The s h o r t e r o f t h e two i n t e r v a l s comprising t h e mixed-interval schedules was always 5 s e c , t h e longer was e i t h e r 1 0 s e c , 20 s e c , 40

sec,

o r 60

sec.

The number o f times each o f t h e two i n t e r v a l s occurred i n t h e s e mixed-interval schedules was v a r i e d . The d a t a were compared with p r e d i c t i o n s from v a r i o u s models of concurrent chain performance and t h e adequacy

of

t h e s e models was discussed. No one model was a good p r e d i c t o r of a l l t h e d a t a . Davison and Temple

'

^s (submitted f o r p u b l i c a t i o n ) model f i t t e d t h e F I v s

- ^FI

d a t a w e l l and f i t t e d t h e

FI

M I d a t a b e t t e r than any o t h e r model. I t was suggested t h a t a "carry overw from one c o n d i t i o n t o t h e next had a f f e c t e d t h e p r e s e n t d a t a . I t

was

a l s o suggested t h a t t h e way i n which Davison aid Temple's p r e d i c t i o n s d i f f e r e d from t h e obtained p r e f e r e n c e

r a t A v a

was t h e r e s u l t of a weighting of t h e i n t e r v a l s i n t h e M I schedules t h a t changed according

t o

t h e p a r t i c u l a r choice arranged.