CONTROLLABILITY OF THE ENVIRONMENT IN SURROGATE-PEER REARED RHESUS MONKEY INFANTS |
| M. Champoux; R. Hommer; P. Roma; C. Shannon and S. Suomi NICHD, NIH Animal Center, P.O. Box 529, Poolesville, MD, 20837, USA |
 |
| The experience of control over environmental outcomes during infancy is essential for development of mastery motivation, self-efficacy, and optimism. Peer-reared rhesus infants that controlled appetitive reinforcer delivery exhibited less emotional reactivity than infants provided identical reinforcers noncontingently. However, peer rearing produced potential inequities in access to operant manipulanda among group members, plus the inability to quantify manipulandum usage by individuals. We developed an apparatus to provide singly-housed, surrogate-peer reared infants with control or no control over treat delivery. This study was conducted to determine the effectiveness of the apparatus and to compare behavioral and physiological measures in infants reared with or without experiences of controllability. Eight infants were housed individually with inanimate surrogates, with peer socialization provided 2-3 hours daily. Apparatuses were placed behind the cages; each apparatus supported a ‘master’ animal (that controlled treat delivery, n = 4) and a ‘yoked’ animal (that received treats noncontingently, n = 4). Operant training commenced when infants were 16 weeks old. All master animals rapidly learned the operant responses, although individual differences in manipulanda use occurred. Yoked animals promptly consumed their treats. The apparatus provided appropriate experiences of controllability and uncontrollability for the master and yoked animals respectively. The groups did not differ on behaviors in the home cage or during socialization. Due to the success of the pilot study, these apparatuses will be implemented in future studies. |
|
|
