Timing like a Rat: A Classroom Demonstration of the Internal Clock

Abstract

Students studying animal learning often have difficulty comprehending the procedures for studying timing and the properties of the internal clock if live animal models are not available. The following demonstration provides an alternative in which students respond for reinforcement using the peak procedure. The demonstration reveals various characteristics of the internal clock, including that it: (a) can be stopped and restarted within a trial, and (b) operates by timing up as opposed to timing down. This analog of the animal experiments helps students acquire a better understanding of the characteristics of the rat's internal clock and the methods needed to study cognitive abilities in nonverbal animals.