Perceptual dominance in discrimination learning by monkeys.

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Abstract
Four rhesus monkeys were tested on a series of 96 15-trial discrimination problems. During the first 6 trials of every problem, the stimuli differed in color, form, and size. The number of relevant cues was reduced on trials 7 to 15 by the elimination of differences in one or two of the dimensions. Six types of problems (CS, CF, FS, C, F, and S), named for the relevant cue or cues that were retained throughout trials 1 to 15, were tested 16 times each. The results were (1) Performance scores were depressed, on all types of problems, on the trial after cue reduction. Only on those problems in which a difference in color was present was trial 7 performance significantly better than chance, (2) Significant differences in performance were observed among the different problem types; problems involving color differences were significantly more discriminable than FS, F, and S. The latter three differed significantly among themselves. The data indicated that, although perceptual dominance has some effect on discrimination learning by monkeys, monkeys, in contrast to rats, learn the significance of all relevant stimulus cues.
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