Association for Behavior Analysis International

Resurgence is the recurrence of a previously extinguished target response (i.e., problem behavior) following a worsening of conditions for a more recently reinforced alternative response through differential reinforcement of alternative behavior (DRA). Researchers across the basic-applied continuum rigorously examine the behavioral processes related to resurgence and provide a better understanding of this phenomenon. Thus, this symposium incorporates recent research evaluating potential mitigation strategies across basic and applied researchers. To start, two presentations will examine data using rats as subjects. The first presentation will examine resurgence following an expanded-operant treatment through DRA. The following presentation investigates alcohol consumption through differential reinforcement of other behavior (DRO) treatment. The following presentation investigates the use of response cost as punishment for target responses during DRA with data collected via crowdsourcing and provides a meta-analytic review of the effects of these results. The last presentation re-evaluates and extends a prior study on treatment duration on the resurgence of destructive behavior within a clinical setting. Audience members will gain insight into variables that may contribute to treatment relapse in both the laboratory and the clinic. Dr. Kathryn Kestner will provide a discussion.

The target audience is graduate students, and faculty doing research in laboratory models of treatment relapse such as resurgence. A basic understanding of the literature on relapse and training conceptualizing experimental procedures of resurgence is recommended.

Resurgence occurs when a worsening of conditions for an alternative response increases a previously reinforced and subsequently extinguished target response. Researchers have evaluated the extent of resurgence-mitigation strategies by punishing target responses during conditions that differentially reinforce an alternative response (i.e., DRA) across different punishers (e.g., shock, response cost, timeouts) and species (e.g., rats, pigeons, fish, humans). We systematically replicated this line of research with human participants recruited via crowdsourcing using response cost as punishment. In Phase 1, we reinforced target responses with points exchangeable for money and did not reinforce alternative responses. In Phase 2, we reinforced alternative responses and parametrically manipulated the magnitude of point loss (-1, -100, -320, -1000) contingent upon target responses. During Phase 3, we arranged a resurgence test by extinguishing target and alternative responses. The results of this experiment suggest similar resurgence effects across groups. The second study was a meta-analytic review to compare the effects of these results to literature that included punishment of target response during Phase 2, across a range of punishers and species. The results of the meta-analysis suggest that including a punishment contingency reduces target responding during Phase 2 but the effects on resurgence are mixed.

Treatments for alcohol use disorders such as contingency management may result in an individual abstaining from alcohol consumption while treatment is in place. However, once treatment is discontinued, resurgence of alcohol consumption may occur. Laboratory investigations of resurgence with alcohol self-administration allow for the development of a better understanding of this phenomenon. However, many laboratory investigations involve extinction of alcohol-seeking, which may have questionable face validity as alcohol is freely available in most applied contexts during treatment and therefore abstinence is voluntary. In this study, a resurgence paradigm without extinction for ethanol seeking was used to study alcohol consumption in rats. During baseline, rats were provided with access to ethanol contingent on lever pressing. Treatment consisted of differential reinforcement of other behavior (DRO). Here, food pellets were delivered following intervals with no lever pressing. During resurgence tests, both ethanol and food were unavailable. DRO treatment was successful at decreasing ethanol seeking to zero and near-zero levels for most rats. Resurgence of ethanol seeking did occur to various degrees. The findings and implications of this study are discussed through the lens of treatments for alcohol use disorder.