Reinforcement effects of specific components of feeding in young leghorn chicks.

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Abstract
A variety of incentives, including food delivered through a plastic tube implanted in the crop, food to be eaten by mouth, and stimulus objects to be pecked at, were presented to chicks singly and in several combinations in the positive goal box of a Y maze. Those incentives which elicited pecking at the time of the delivery of nutrients were in all cases reinforcing. Neither the delivery of nutrients into the crop, alone, nor the elicitation of pecking alone, was sufficient to produce learning. The results suggest that the internal effects of the delivery of nutrients and the consummatory stimulus feedback from pecking are both sources of reinforcement, but only in interaction with one another.

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