Stanley J. Weiss, Ph.D. The Ohio State University, 1963 Professor of Experimental Psychology Instrumental Learning and Classical Conditioning Laboratory

Office:	Asbury 319A
Office telephone:	(202) 885-1724
Fax:	(202) 885-1023
E-Mail address:	sweiss@american.edu
Winter Conference on Animal Learning and Behavior

Research Interests

My current research concentrates on:

• Stimulus Control of Behavior
• Incentive Motivation
• Drugs and Behavior
• Animal Models of Drug Abuse
• Biological Constraints on Learning
• Two-Process Learning Theory
• Appetitive-Aversive Interaction Theory of Motivation
  

Honors and Awards

Current Research Support

Title: Incentive Properties of Abused Drugs
Sponsor: NIDA
Amount of Award: $850,000
Effective Dates: Aug. 2002 through Aug. 2007

Abstract: There is a developing consensus that environmental stimuli associated with the drug-taking experience can acquire the capacity to energize drug craving, seeking and consumption. The PI has developed a "stimulus-compounding" model of drug abuse that elucidates how multiple drug-associated stimuli interact to motivate drug-related behavior. Research stimulated by this model has revealed that simply exposing rats to certain combinations of drug-related cues can override the mechanisms that normally regulate drug-intake, causing them to double their intake of cocaine or heroin and triple their rates of drug seeking. The human drug abuse environment is rife with cues that could have analogous effects. Thus, environmentally-induced enhancement of drug intake may be one factor responsible for the spiraling escalation and "uncontrollability" of drug use often seen in addicted individuals. In the proposed research, we will continue to investigate the excitatory conditions that determine how long this escalation is sustained. However, the proposed research will primarily explore methods by which drug taking can be reduced.

Conditioned inhibitors are stimuli that signal drug absence and may thereby attenuate or even eliminate the incentive motivation that drives drug-related behavior. The systematic investigation of conditioned inhibition within the context of drug self-administration will be the major new objective of this program and should provide information relevant to the treatment of drug abuse. Strategies will be compared to determine the most effective means of counteracting a history of excitatory drug-related conditioning. When the program is completed, we should have a better understanding of: (1) how conditioned inhibitors can attenuate the motivation to abuse drugs, (2) how the motivational effects of multiple drug-related stimuli might lead to persistent, uncontrollable escalation of drug use, and (3) how drug and non-drug reinforcement processes are related.

Representative Publications

Weiss, S. J., Kearns, D., Cohn, S., Schindler, C. W., & Panlilio, L. V. (2003). Stimulus Control of Drug Self-Administration. Journal of the Experimental Analysis of Behavior, 2003, 79, 111-135.

Kearns, D. N., Weiss, S. J., & Panlilio, L. V. (2002). Conditioned suppression of behavior maintained by cocaine. Drug & Alcohol Dependence, 65, 253-261

Panlilio, L. V., Weiss, S., J., & Schindler, C. W. (2000). Effects of compounding drug-related stimuli: escalation of heroin self-administration. Journal of the Experimental Analysis of Behavior, 2000, 73, 211-222.

Weiss, S. J., Thomas, D. A., & Weissman, R. D. (1996). Combining operant-baseline derived conditioned excitors and inhibitors from the same and different incentive class: An investigation of appetitive-aversive interactions. Quarterly Journal of Experimental Psychology: Comparative and Physiological Psychology, 49B, 357-381.

Weiss, S. J., Panlilio, L. V., & Schindler, C. W. (1993).Single-incentive selective associations produced solely as a function of compound-stimulus conditioning context. Journal of Experimental Psychology: Animal Behavior Processes, 19, 284-294.

Weiss, S. J., & Weissman, R. W. (1992). Generalization peakshift for operant and autoshaped keypecks. Journal of the Experimental Analysis of Behavior, 57, 127-143.

Weiss, S. J., & Schindler, C. W. (1985). Conditioning history and inhibitory instrumental stimulus control: Independent-groups and within-subjects measures. Animal Learning & Behavior, 13, 215-222.

Weiss, S. J. & Dacanay, R. (1982). Incentive processes and the peak shift. Journal of the Experimental Analysis of Behavior, 37, 441-453.

Weiss, S. J. (1978). Discriminated response and incentive processes in operant conditioning: A two-factor model of stimulus control. A integrative theoretical article in the Journal of the Experimental Analysis of Behavior, 30, 361-381.

Weiss, S. J. (1972). Stimulus compounding in free-operant and classical conditioning: A review and analysis. Psychological Bulletin, 78, 189-208.

Charles Cunningham, Professor, Department of Psychiatry & Behavioral Neuroscience, McMaster University Health Sciences, (52+ publications). Dissertation: Compounding discriminative stimuli controlling free-operant responding: A comparative analysis of complex stimulus control in the normal and retarded child.

Leigh Panlilio, IRTA Fellow, NIDA Intramural Research Program, (15+ publications). Dissertation: Cocaine self-administration increased by compounding discriminative stimuli.

Charles Schindler, Senior Research Psychologist, Preclinical Pharmacology Laboratory, NIDA Intramural Research Program, (76+ publications). Dissertation: The influence of positive and negative reinforcement on selective attention.

David Thomas, Acting Chief, Translational Research Branch, Division of Neuroscience, NIDA (24+ publications). Dissertation: Effects of chlordiazepoxide and lumazenil on preference for punished and unpunished response alternatives in rats.

Richard Weissman, Team Leader and Clinical Coordinator, Children's Crisis Treatment Center, (3 publications). Dissertation: Simultaneous appetitive and defensive arousal on an operant baseline without reciprocal inhibition.

Recent Presentations

SJW has made approximately 170 such presentations. Those given in 2003 through June 2004 are listed below:

2003 Fulbright Lectures
Pavlov Medical University, St. Petersburg, Russia

OPERANT AND CLASSICAL CONDITIONING:
A POINT NATURAL OF INTERSECTION

Weiss, S. J., Kearns, D S., Schindler, C. W., Panlilio, L. V. & Weissman (2003). Conditioned Inhibition for food, shock-avoidance and cocaine self-administration maintained behavior. Winter Conference on Animal Learning and Behavior, Winter Park, CO.

Kearns, D., & Weiss, S. J. (2003). Investigations of sign-tracking (autoshaping) to food and to cocaine-related stimuli. Eastern Psychological Association, Baltimore, MD.

Weiss, S. J., Kearns, D S., Schindler, C. W., Panlilio, L. V (2003). Drug-related conditioned inhibition: A comparison of A+/AB- and A+/B- designs.. Psychonomic Society, Vancouver, Canada. (In Abstracts of the Psychonomic Society, 2003, 8)

Invited Addresses:

Stimulus control and incentive motivation: From food to drug self-administration. Finland National Institute of Health, Helsinki, Finland, 2003.

The instrumentally derived incentive-motive function: Applications to drug self-administration. Medical College of Virginia, Richmond, VA, 2003.

Stimulus control of cocaine self-administration.
Arizona State University, Tempe, AZ, 2003
Medical College of Virginia, Richmond, VA, 2003

Weiss, Stanley J. (2004). Pavlov and St. Petersburg. Winter Conference on Animal Learning and Behavior, Winter Park, CO.

Weiss, S. J., Kearns, D., Cohn, S., Schindler, C. W., & Panlilio, L. V. (2004). Investigations of intraincentive selective associations when behavior is maintained by food, shock-avoidance or cocaine Self-administration. Winter Conference on Animal Learning and Behavior, Winter Park, CO.

Cohn, S. I., & Weiss, S. J. (2004). Compounding olfactory and auditory discriminative stimuli on a free-operant baseline. Eastern Psychological Association, Washington, DC.

Kearns, D. N., & Weiss, S. J. (2004). Reinstating of a food-maintained operant response produced by compounding discriminative stimuli. Eastern Psychological Association, Washington, DC.

Weiss, S. J., Kearns, D S., Schindler, C. W., Panlilio, L. V (2004). Animal model of drug abuse demonstarates that cocaine seeking in humans might be reduced by environmental cues through conditioned inhibition. American Society of Pharmacology and Experimental Therapeutics, Washington, DC. (Abstracted in The Pharmacologist, 2004, 46.)

Kearns, D S., Weiss, S. J., Schindler, C. W., Panlilio, L. V (2004). Reduction of cocaine-seeking through conditioned inhibition. International Study Group Investigating Drugs as Reinforcers. San Juan, PR.

Abridged Curriculum Vitae