Generalization of Auditory Intensity as a Function of Small Amounts of Discrimination Training¹

Rats were trained on a two-valued auditory-intensity discrimination for 5, 2, 1 or 0 days. Then, the bar-press response rate was sampled in the presence of seven added discrimination stimuli (generalization) for seven days. Daily training sessions were 4 hr in length throughout the experiment. Only the five-day group exhibited a marked superiority on the multi-valued discrimination when contrasted with the group having had no prior simple discrimination training.