Principles of Behavior Sixth Edition

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Principles of BehaviorSixth Edition
Power Point Presentation Richard W.
Malott Western Michigan University
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Chapter 2 Reinforcement (Positive Reinforcement))
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Fundamentals

• An example of Reinforcement
• Behavioral Social Work The Grandfather1
• Juke is a highly successful behavior analyst.
• His grandfather had a stroke that paralyzed his
  right side.
• After the stroke, his grandfather rarely talked,
  and when he did, he didnt make much sense.

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The Grandfather, contd

• How did Jukes grandmother keep track of his
  grandfathers remarks?
• She counted the number of times he talked
• She counted the number of responses that made
  sense and the ones that didnt make sense
• What were the baseline data?
• Average of less than one response per hour
• 67 of his comments made sense

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The Grandfather, contd

• Jukes grandmother set aside one hour per day for
  a reinforcement procedure

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The Grandfather, contd

• What were the results?
• In 6 weeks, spontaneous remarks increased from
  less than 1 per hour to 2.5 per hour.
• Sensible replies increased from 67 to 84.

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Reinforcement

• What is the Reinforcement Principle?
• Reinforcement Principle
• A response will occur more frequently if a
  reinforcer or an increase in a reinforcer has
  followed it in the past, in similar settings.

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What is Reinforcement?

• Reinforcement Contingency
• The response-contingent
• presentation of
• a reinforcer,
• resulting in an increased frequency of that
  response.

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Again, how quickly should the reinforcer follow
the response?

• Certainly
• less than 60 seconds
• Ideally
• less than 1 second

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What is the Delay Gradient?

• Delay Gradient
• The effects of reinforcement and punishment
  contingencies decrease as the delay between the
  response and the outcome increases.

• What happens if a reinforcer is delayed more than
  60 seconds?
• Reinforcers delayed more than 60 seconds have
  little or no reinforcing effect.

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Behavioral Contingencies

• What do we mean by response-contingent?
• Response-contingent caused by or produced by the
  response
• What do we mean by occasion?
• Occasion a stimulus in the presence of which a
  particular response will produce a particular
  outcome. Not the same as the before condition.

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What is a Behavioral Contingency?

• Behavioral Contingency
• The occasion for a response,
• the response, and
• the outcome of the response.

Text Boxes
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What is a Non-Contingent Event?

• Non-Contingent Event
• An event that is not dependent on anything.
• Examples A child sneezes and then the
  electricity goes out. The power failure was not
  contingent on the sneeze.

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What is the Environmental-Quality General Rule?

• You can increase the frequency of entering a
  setting by putting more reinforcers in that
  setting, but you will have to make some
  reinforcers contingent on productive behavior if
  you want to increase productivity in that
  setting.
• Common error To think that changing the quality
  of the environment will result in increased
  productivity.

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The Delivery of Reinforcers Before the Behavior

• Mr. Big gives an envelope with 10,000 to a young
  woman.
• Heres 10,000 to throw the NCAA volleyball
  game.
• Is this Reinforcement?
• NO! The money came before the despicable act, not
  after it.
• Is this Bribery?
• YES! Bribery is the use of a reinforcer, often
  (but not always) given in advance, for the
  performance of an illegal or immoral act.

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Reinforcement or Bribery?
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Bribery
The reinforcer (Thank you) is coming before the
behavior (doing laundry).
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Bubblegum Bowel Movements Part 12

• 3-year old Todd was averaging one bowel movement
  per week.
• Dawn, the behavior analyst, noticed that Todd
  liked his moms bubblegum.
• What was the Procedural Solution?
• Give Todd a piece of bubblegum immediately after
  each bowel movement, but not before.

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Successful Intervention
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Povertys Children Part 13

• Mae, the behavior analyst, set up a classroom as
  a preschool for 15 black children from low-income
  families (ages 4-5).
• The children scored an average of 79 on the
  Peabody Picture Vocabulary Test (national average
  is 100).

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Povertys Children, contd

• According to National Studies
• Is poverty correlated to formal language skills?
• YES
• Do terrible language skills increase the
  probability of failing school?
• YES
• Does this lower the chances of finding a good
  job?
• YES

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Observing the Children

• What was the problem?
• Maes children rarely used adjectives
• e.g., color names, sizes, shapes, or numbers
• What was the solution?
• Reinforce any appropriate use of adjectives

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• What were the results?
• Nothing. The children produced only 3-4
  adjectives per hour.
• What did Mae conclude?
• The childrens baseline rate (pre-intervention
  rate) was too low for reinforcement to have an
  effect.
• Not enough occasions for reinforcement.
• Stay tuned to find out what happens with Mae and
  the children

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Basic Enrichment

• What is a Skinner Box?
• B.F. Skinners commonly used test chamber
  (invented by Douglas Ellson).
• Includes a response device (e.g., a lever) and a
  source of reinforcers (e.g., water).

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Avoid Circular Reasoning
Why does Rudolph drink the water?
Rudolph wants the water.
Rudolph drinks the water.
How do you know Rudolph wants the water?
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Use Non-Circular Explanations
Why does Rudolph drink the water?
How do you know the temperature is 120F?
Because thats what the thermometer says.
Because the temperature is 120F in the box.
Rudolph drinks the water.
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What is the Error of Reification?

• The Error of Reification
• To call a behavior or process a thing.

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Example

• Why does Jenny act so strangely (a behavior)?
  Because she has a mental illness (a thing). How
  do you know she has a mental illness? Because
  shes acting so strangely
• The proof of the existence of the thing is the
  behavior that the thing was supposed to explain.

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What is the Medical Model Myth?

• Medical Model Myth
• An erroneous view of human behavior
• that behavior is always a mere symptom of
• an underlying psychological condition.

My assistant is passive aggressive. He agrees to
do the tasks I ask him to do, but then he doesnt
do them. Hes passively aggressing against me
because he doesnt like me.
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A More Behavioral Approach
Your approval is a powerful reinforcer, and it
reinforces your assistants agreeing to do the
tasks. But without clear-cut deadlines, even
that powerful reinforcer will fail to control
your assistants behavior Without deadlines,
procrastination will take over.
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Success with Behavioral Approach

• Barb Fulton4 measured her assistants task
  completion
• What was the baseline condition?
• Orally assigning tasks and not following up when
  assistants do not complete the tasks.

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What was the Intervention?

• Intervention
• Holding weekly meetings where she assigned tasks
  in writing, gave due dates, and checked on task
  completion.

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Successful Intervention
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More Examples of MedicalModel Myth

• A woman fails to get her homework done in time
• What is the Medical Model Interpretation?
• This failure is a symptom of the underlying cause
  of an unconscious fear of success.
• What is the Behavioral Interpretation?
• Doing almost anything else is more reinforcing
  and less effortful than homework.

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Root Causes

• Medical Model
• Invents fictional causes
• Behavioral Model
• Addresses actual causes
• Example
• We dont smoke cigarettes because we are fixated
  on our oral stage of infantile development.
• We smoke because smoking is reinforced by the
  outcome.

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What is the Dont Say Rule?

• The Dont Say rule
• With non-verbal organisms, dont say
• Expects
• Knows
• Thinks
• Figures out
• In order to (or so that he, she, it could)

• Trying to
• Makes the connection
• Associates
• Learns that
• Imagines
• Understands
• With any organisms, dont say wants.

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What is the Reinforce Behavior general rule?

• Reinforce Behavior
• Reinforce behavior,
• not people.

Dont reinforce us
Reinforce our behavior!
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Reinforcer vs. Reinforcement

• Whats the difference?
• Reinforcer
• Thing, event, or change of conditions
• Reinforcement
• The delivery of the reinforcer and the resulting
  change in behavior

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Baseline

• Juke measured his grandfathers sensible remarks
  during baseline
• Barb Fulton measured her assistants task
  completion during baseline
• What is baseline?

• Baseline
• The phase of an experiment or intervention
• where the behavior is measured
• in the absence of an intervention.

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Intermediate Enrichment

• Reinforcement vs. Analog to Reinforcement
• With verbal human beings, reinforcers can follow
  responses by more than 60 seconds.
• We will cover this more in chapter 22.

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Reinforcement

• Instead of saying, Presentation of a
  reinforcer, it is more precise to say,
• Presentation or increase in a reinforcer.

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Example
Youre sipping soda through a crimped straw.
But if you straighten your crimped straw, the
soda flows more quickly.
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And another thing

• Reinforcement occurs when the current occasion
  for the response
• is similar to occasions when the response has
  been reinforced in the past.

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Example
See Chapter 12 for more info on these
discriminated contingencies
In the past Rods tantrumming has been reinforced
by Dad So when Dads around
Rod is likely to get attention.
And Rod has little or no attention
If Rod tantrums
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And
If in the past, you worked with Rudolph the rat
only when he was deprived of water And you used
water as a reinforcer for his response of mouse
clicking Then if you put him in the Skinner box
after he has had a lot to drink
Hes probably not going to perform very
frequently.
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Learn more about Motivating Operations in Chapter
9
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So an exhaustingly exhaustive re-defined
definition of Reinforcement Contingency could be

• Reinforcement Contingency
• The presentation
• Or increase of
• A reinforcer
• Promptly following a response
• Resulting in an increased frequency of that
  response
• On similar occasions
• And with similar motivating operations.

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Circular Reasoning and Reifications

• Do all circular arguments result in a
  reification?
• NO!
• Example?

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Circular argument that does not involve the
reification of any concepts.
Why is Rudolph pressing the lever?
Because hes now pressing the lever.
In the past, lever pressing has produced drops
of water.
How do you know lever pressing has produced drops
of water?
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Advanced Enrichment

• What would that example be?
• Circular reification. What is this?
• Inferring a cause, usually an internal entity,
  which is just a label for the behavior were
  trying to explain.

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Whats another type of reification?

• Process reification. Whats this?
• Inferring an internal entity, which is just a
  label for a controlling process (typically
  contingencies).

Why am I acting so selfishly?
Because your ID is strong and your Ego and
Superego are underdeveloped
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Join us for Chapter 3Escape
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Footnotes

• 1. Based on Green, G. R., Linsk, N. L.,
  Pinkston, E. M. (1986). Modification of verbal
  behavior of the mentally impaired elderly by
  their spouses. Journal of Applied Behavior
  Analysis, 19, 329-336.
• 2. Based on Tomlinson, J. R. (1970). Bowel
  retention. Journal of Behavior Therapy and
  Experimental Psychiatry, 2, 83-85.
• 3. Based on Hart, B. M., Risley, T. R. (1968).
  Establishing use of descriptive adjectives in the
  spontaneous speech of disadvantaged preschool
  children. Journal of Applied Behavior Analysis,
  1, 109-120.
• 4. Fulton, B. J., Malott, R. W. (1981-1982).
  The structured meeting system A procedure for
  improving the completion of nonrecurring tasks.
  Journal of Organizational Behavior Management,
  3(4), 7-18.