Si~nmary.-A rathrr general S-R paradigm is proposed in which stimulus biases, response biases, activation or general responsiveness, and association are defined as patterns of response strength or occurrence when a variety of responses are recorded to a variety of stimuli (an S-R matrix). Patterns of differences between similar matrices obtained on different occasions or with different groups of Ss are similarly defined as increments in stimulus biases, responses biases, activation, and association. Applications of the general paradigm to conditioning, verbal learning, and transfer srudies are suggested. In a recent experimenc (Babich, Jacobson, Bubash, e( Jacobson, 1965) riboniicleic acid (RNA) was excracted from the brains of rats previously crained co approach a food cup at the sound of a click. Untrained rats injected with this RNA made significantly more cup-approach responses when the click was sounded than a concrol group injected with RNA from uncrained rat brains. The authors state that various alternative interpretations of their results are possible, including memory coding in the RNA molecule. The ambiguity of the results of this experiment illustrates a methodological shortcoming common to many current S-R research efforcs: E is unablc to discriminate between general activation, stimulus and response biases, and S-R concingency or association. Although it is possible thac che parclculsr response of approaching the food cup when che click sounded was coded in the RNA from trained racs, there are ocher interpretations of the results which are more parsimonious. The RNA from trained animals might somehow increase the general activity of animals into which it is injected; perhaps the animals become more responsive in general to all stimu1i.l The obtained results might have been obtained by sensitizing the animals to the particular stimulus used; perhaps the RNA from trained animals made the experimental animals more sensitive to the click so that all responses to the click, including che cup-approach response, were made with greater frequency after injeccion. Finally, the RNA from crained animals might have produced a response bias; that is, approach responses might have been increased to all stimuli. In the - simple experimental design in which the observer records only a single response to a single stimulus, these differenc and potentially differentiable kinds of behavior are not discriminable. Without trying different stimuli, E cannoc show . that the response is stimulus specific; without recording a variety of possible responses, E cannot show that any response specificity exists, and without both 'An analogous activation effect might be obtained with white rats by injecting them with the blood of animals which hd undergone stressful training. The blood from the stressed animals might contain adrendin or some other activating substance, and the injected animals, becoming more active, might make the response of interest with greater frequency; such transfer of training a1ou;d hardly be regarded as memory coding.