Class: Next Mon. Sept. 12
Text: pp. 138-158
"Can students be paid to excel?"
School-wide programs for good and
reducing bad behavior
Instrumental Learning- Thorndike:
Cat in the box experiment. What
happened ?
Optional: Your idea for your behavior
modification project
The Cat Learned !!!
Behavior Change = Learning
Major Differences (2)
1. Operant Conditioning the individual
(actively) operates on the environment to bring
about reinforcement.
Classical Conditioning the individual is
passive.
2. Classical Conditioning involuntary response.
Operant Conditioning voluntary response.
Primary Reinforcers
Secondary Reinforcers
Consequences that satisfy a
biologically built-in need.
Consequence that becomes reinforcing
over time through its association with
another reinforcer.
Food, water, warmth, fixes
Praise, hugs, money
1
Extrinsic Reinforcers
Reinforcers from the outside environment.
Concrete
Social
Activity - Premack principle engage in less
preferred activities to gain access to more
preferred activities
Shaping Reinforces Closer
Approximations to Desired
Behavior
Shaping (or the method of successive
approximations): teaching a new
behavior by reinforcing closer and
closer approximations to the desired
behavior
Positive feedback
Accidental Reinforcement Can Cause
Superstitious Behavior
Superstitious behavior: learned because it happened to be
followed by a reinforcer, even though this behavior was not
the cause of the reinforcer.
Skinner trained superstitious behavior in hungry pigeons.
He reasoned that when reinforcement occurred, it would
be paired with whatever response the pigeons had just
performed.
Reducing and eliminating
undesirable behaviors
Extinction
Cueing inappropriate behaviors
Reinforcing incompatible behaviors
Punishment
Instances of accidental reinforcement triggering
superstitious behavior is common among people.
Punishment
Punishment
Punishment
aversive event that decreases the
behavior that it follows
powerful controller of unwanted
behavior
2
Positive and Negative Reinforcement, Positive
and Negative Punishment
Punishment
Opposite of Rinforcement
Attempts to decrease
behavior by introducing
an unpleasant punisher
Problems With Punishment
Behavior is not forgotten - merely
suppressed
(may reappear in other situations)
P does not guide toward acceptable
behavior
(doesnt tell you what you should do)
Effective Forms of Punishment
Ineffective Punishers
Mild, safe, private forms including:
Verbal reprimands
Response cost
Logical consequences
Time-out
1. Physical Punishment - Spanking, physical discomfort
Can teach that is acceptable for more powerful
individuals to hurt others
2. Psychological punishment - Public humiliation,
ridicule
Can lead to low self-esteem
3. Extra homework
Sends the message that homework is undesirable
In-school suspension
Ineffective Punishers
4.
Withdrawal of Recess
5.
Necessary activity to focus attention
Useful for health purposes
Attention decreases after prolonged confinement
Out-of-school suspensions
May not be viewed as a punishment
Given disproportionately to lower SES and minority
students
Operant principles can help
hyperactive children
In 30-50 percent of the cases, drug treatments
are ineffective
Sample of 9 children assigned to a therapy
program for 10 weeks and later compared them
with a group of 8 non-treated but equally
hyperactive children in the third to fifth grades.
3
Treatment A condition
home-based reward program
5 components
Specification of each childs daily classroom goals
Praising the child for efforts to achieve those goals
End of the day evaluation of the childs behavior
relevant to the specified goals
Send the parents a daily report card on their childs
daily progress
Reward of the child by the parent for progress
toward his goals.
Results
Children in the operant therapy group showed
significant improvement on both of the rating
scales
Rated as less hyperactive by their teachers and
exhibited fewer problem behaviors.
2 measures were made before and after treatment
A teachers rating scale was employed that measured
the degree of inattentiveness, anxiety, conduct
problems and hyperactivity displayed by the child.
A specifically designed problem-behavior rating scale
was established for each; an 8 point rating of the
severity of 4 or 5 problem behaviors for each child
Behavioral Concepts
Behavior Modification shaping by modifying
reinforcement schedule
Premack Principle (engage in less preferred
activities to gain access to more preferred
activities
Token Economies (gold, silver card)
Contingency Contracting -individual
Group contingencies (the entire class)
Extinction, Time-out, and Response Cost
Punishment
Partial Reinforcement
Positive
Reinforcement
Extrinsic
Intrinsic
Behavior-Based Reinforcers
Fixed Ratio - reinforce every n responses
Variable Ratio - reinforce after ?? responses
Time-Based Reinforcers
Fixed Interval - reinforce after fixed time
Variable Interval - reinforce after ?? time
4
Maintaining desirable
behaviors
Using intermittent reinforcement
- reinforcement schedules
Fixed Ratio e.g., reinforcement after
every 3rd response (1:3 ratio schedule) Leads to a
high and consistent response rate.
Variable Ratio e.g., after a certain
number of responses have been made.
Unpredictable maybe after 4 responses, maybe
after 7 - slot machines, telephone solicitations.
Leads to a higher response rate than fixed ration.
Highly resistant to extinction
Intermittent Reinforcement
Fixed Interval e.g, after a fixed amount of time has
elapsed. A unique response pattern. A scalloped look
studying drops way down until the next exam is near. Biweekly paycheck, too
Variable Interval e.g after a certain variable time interval
has elapsed. Somewhat unpredictable. 5 minutes after
the 1st response is made, next time 1 minutes. Results in
a slow, steady rate of responding. The longer the time
interval until reinforcement, the longer the response rate
will be.
You try to call your friend you know she talks on the
phone a lot, but you continue to dial the phone number
every few minutes until eventually your call goes
through.
Schedules of Reinforcement
Number of
responses
1000
Fixed Ratio
Variable Ratio
Fixed Interval
750
Rapid responding
near time for
reinforcement
500
Variable Interval
250
Steady responding
0
Using Consequences
10
20
30
40
50
Time (minutes)
60
70
80
Strategies Based on Preferences
5
Behavior Modification
Assignment
What is a single subject design?
Analysis of Pret a Manger
Apply the behavioral concepts to real
life.
Kohn
Punished by Rewards
The Trouble with Gold Stars,
Incentive Plans, A's, Praise, and
Other Bribes
(Boston: Houghton Mifflin, 1993 /
1999)
In fact, the more we use
artificial inducements to
motivate people, the more they
lose interest in what we're
bribing them to do. Rewards
turn play into work, and work
into drudgery.
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