This research examined in 26 undergraduate students a form ofinstructional control of certain emergent relations definitional of thestimulus-equivalence relationship. The subjects read 2 pages thatexplained a paper-and-pencil match-to-sample procedure, and thenwent on to solve 11 more pages of matching-to-sample problems.Each of the first 10 of these last 11 pages was introduced by aninstruction of the form, u22Matches means [verb],u22 for example, u22Matchesmeans EATS,u22 followed by the facts that established two relatedconditional discriminations in the specific forms, A [verb] 1, B [verb] 2,1 [verb] X, and 2 [verb]yu27 Of 12 subsequent probes on the same page,4 tested for these original relations and 8 for any symmetry, transitivity,and symmetric-transitivity (often called equivalence) properties ofthose relations. The 11 th (final) page was introduced by theinstruction: u27u27This time, no meaning of matches is specified.u22 Of the 10pages, 5 specifying a verb as the meaning of u22matchesu22 usedequivalence verbs (EQUALS, IS, IS PARALLEL TO, GOES WITH, andMATCHES); another 5 specified nonequivalence verbs (EATS,OWES, PAYS, LIKES, and TEACHES). For 15 of 25 subjects, differentverbs differentially controlled the emergence of the untrained relationsrevealing the symmetry, transitivity, and symmetric-transitivityproperties of the original relations. For the remaining 10 subjects,these untrained relations either emerged uniformly despite verbdifferences (5 subjects), or were absent despite verb differences (5subjects). The types of verbs or explanations provided by the subjectsin response to the 11th problem, which offered no verb but requestedan explanation of how the subjects had answered the probes, alwaysreflected each subjectu27s prior equivalence or nonequivalenceresponding to the earlier probes. Thus, imposing relevant instructionson two directly established interlocking conditional discriminations canaccount for much of the emergence of the new, untrained relationsdefinitional of equivalence relations.
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