ABSTRACT
Environmental events, the stimuli of stimulus control, are present before, during, and after the occurrence of the reinforcer. The rapid solution of major substantive problems in the area of stimulus control is due in large measure to the elegance of techniques for reliably assessing the control of behavior by these environmental events. The phenomenon of errorless learning has played a major role in theories of stimulus control. A stimulus-generalization gradient is employed to determine the properties of the stimuli that have acquired control over responding. In the single-stimulus method, a response is reinforced in the presence of one stimulus. An interresponse time analysis of the rate of responding is a useful technique for determining the essential characteristics of stimulus control. In the experiments on the positive and negative peak shifts, the continuum was defined by a dimension of a stimulus. Contextual stimuli are stimuli within the experimental apparatus that remain uncorrelated with the contingencies of reinforcement in the experimental chamber.
