Stimulus Relations Analysis and the Emergence of Novel Intraverbals. Luis Antonio Pérez-González, Katia Herszlikowicz, and Gladys Williams

In three experiments designed to analyze the emergence of untaught operants
with a spoken response in normally developing 5- to 6-year-old children, verbal
operants with the names of countries, cities, and parks were used as stimuli
or responses—intraverbals. Children learned Country-City intraverbals and
City-Park intraverbals. The authors then probed the emergence of novel intraverbals
without reinforcement, which resulted from combining the stimuli and
responses of the taught intraverbals. Experiment 1 demonstrated that the novel
intraverbals might emerge without reinforcement. Experiment 2 showed that
learning more basic operants facilitates the emergence of the novel intraverbals.
Experiment 3 provided a within-participant replication and demonstrated that
relations with novel stimuli of the same type emerge at a quicker pace as children
learn novel sets. These results showed basic processes involved in complex
verbal behavior, such as reasoning.