Cardiac Rate of the Rat under a DRL and a Non-Contingent Temporal Schedule of Reinforcement

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Abstract
Two experiments were conducted in an attempt to produce conditioning of the rat's heart-rate response to periodic presentations of a positive reinforcer. In the first study, milk was presented once every 60 sec. to 2 Ss and once every 240 sec. to 2 other Ss. The unconditioned cardiac response to the milk was an increase in cardiac rate, and, while it was shown that the increase became conditioned to auditory stimulation which accompanied the milk, no evidence of temporal conditioning was found. In the second study, heart rates were observed during a DRL reinforcement schedule for lever pressing. Once again, no evidence of temporal conditioning was found, although there was an indication that heart rate increases following reinforced lever press responses were greater than following unreinforced presses.

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