Conditioning and Transfer of Therapist Operations

Abstract

Thirty-six Ss listened to a series of recorded “patient's” statements simulating excerpts from therapeutic sessions of a female patient. Following each statement Ss chose one of two “therapist's” comments presented on cards. The two therapist's comments were either directive or interpretive in content. Following an operant block, one group was reinforced for choosing directive (D) therapist's comments, a second group for interpretive (I) comments, while a third group received no reinforcement. After 30 acquisition trials, all groups were tested on a transfer task in which they had to devise their own comments in response to additional patient statements. Both experimental groups conditioned, increasing their choice of reinforced therapist's comments over acquisition trials. The group reinforced for interpretive comments conditioned at a faster rate than the group reinforced for directive comments. The results suggested that on the transfer task the groups continued to differ in their use of the two response classes for which they had been reinforced.