Sources of Information Which Affect Training and Raising of Heart Rate.

This study was concerned with the effects of cardiac information and reinforcement on raising heart rate (HR). The experiment consisted of a 3 × 2 design with three types of cardiac information and two reinforcement conditions. The cardiac information given to Ss consisted of instructions to control an Internal response (no specific HR information), instructions to increase HR (specific HR information), or instructions to increase HR while hearing heart beats through earphones (augmented HR information). External reinforcement was given to one-half of these Ss, while the remaining Ss received no external reinforcement. Sixty female undergraduates were randomly assigned to one of these six experimental groups. Analyses of these data indicate that Ss in both the augmented and specific HR information groups were able to increase their HR. The no specific HR information groups showed no increases in KR, suggesting that awareness of the criterion response plays an important role in raising HR. No differences were found between the reinforcement conditions. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]