Some of our findings indicate that pecking, a behavior that may appear entirely innate to the casual observer, is actually the product of a complex interaction between innate, social, and conditioned processes. In a current series of projects, we are looking at how the experience of reward or nonreward affects response variability in humans in animals. Our findings indicate that nonreward induces response variability, and reward inhibits response variability. See some of our publications on these topics. A fundamental aspect of behavior that we study is how behavior comes to be timed.
Any skilled action requires that behavior occur in a precise temporal pattern.
When we learn to anticipate an impending event, such as the changing of a traffic light from yellow to red, we learn a specific temporal expectation. Animals use the passage of time to determine if they should continue to forage for food or switch to a new search area. In many ways, timing is a fundamental aspect of the organization of behavior. In our lab, we have been studying how the temporal distribution of rewards affects behavior in both Pavlovian and instrumental conditioning . In addition to characterizing the behavioral characteristics we have also begun to explore the neural substrates of timing in collaboration with the labs of Profs.