Negative Reinforcement

1
Negative Reinforcement

• The removal or discontinuance of a stimulus
  contingent upon a response, resulting in a future
  increase in the occurrence of the response
• When asked why he is hitting himself over the
  head with a hammer the fellow replied Because it
  feels good when I stop.

2
Types of Negative Reinforcement

• I. Escape
• Escape involves a response that terminates an
  ongoing aversive stimulation
• The aversive stimulus or situation is already
  being experienced
• II. Avoidance
• Avoidance involves performing a response that
  postpones the onset of aversive stimulation

3
Developing Avoidance Behavior

• As the aversive stimulus is experienced, cues are
  noticed by the organism which signal the onset of
  the aversive stimulus and which become
  conditioned aversive stimuli
• Organisms experiencing signaled aversive stimuli
  can be relaxed, performing the avoidance response
  as necessary, never experiencing the aversive
  stimulus
• If the aversive stimulus is unsignaled, the
  organism will not know when to perform the
  avoidance response

4
A Model of Neurotic Behavior

• The compulsive and repetitive nature of
  unsignaled avoidance behavior provides a model
  for what has been called neurosis
• The person caught in an unsignaled avoidance
  situation will continuously perform the avoidance
  response and will be very anxious when not
  performing it
• The person is fearful if not performing the
  behavior
• Its the not knowing that produces the
  fear
• The person might also become passive and
  unresponsive (learned helplessness)

5
Extinction of Avoidance Behavior

• Avoidance behavior is difficult to extinguish
• The person does not know when the aversive
  stimulus is no longer available
• Extinguishing avoidance responses The person
  must refrain from performing the avoidance
  response when the signal is experienced

6
Extinguishing Avoidance Behaviors

• In order to extinguish an avoidance response, the
  person must come in contact with the avoided
  situation without experiencing the aversive
  stimulus
• This can be done gradually or all at once
• Doing it gradually involves a procedure known as
  desensitization
• Doing it all at once is known as flooding

7
Systematic Desensitization

• This procedure functions by gradually exposing
  the person to a feared stimulus or situation and
  replacing the fear response with an incompatible
  response
• It involves three stages
• 1. Relaxation training (the incompatible
  response)
• 2. Development of a fear hierarchy
• 3. Exposing the person through mental images
  to the scenes of the fear hierarchy while the
  person is relaxed

8
Desensitization with a child

• When using desensitization with a child, teaching
  relaxation techniques is often not an option so
  an alternative distractor can be used