Resistance to Impulsivity and Temporal Discounting in Canis lupus familiaris

• Main Author: Dow, Willey
• Format: Text
• Language: unknown
• Published: Scholarship@Western 2013
• Subjects: Psychology; Lever; Canis lupus
• Online Access: https://ir.lib.uwo.ca/hucjlm/vol51/iss1/5

Based on the Petter, Musolino, Roberts, and Cole (2009) finding that dogs were able to utilize cues to choose a baited container at a rate significantly higher than they chose an empty container and the Cole (1990) finding that albino rats continued to press a lever after an initial lever press delivered a foot pellet when additional lever presses banked pellets the current study predicted that a dog could learn to make decisions that resist impulsivity for a reward delivered after a short temporal delay. The results of this experiment support that prediction. The subject chose to consume a smaller quantity of food from a white container significantly more often than an equal or larger quantity of food from a black container when rewarded for doing so.