PSYC 1103 Lecture Notes - Lecture 4: Reinforcement, Operant Conditioning
29 Mar 2016
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Document Summary
Operant extinction: weakening and eventual disappearance of a response because it is no longer reinforced, when previously reinforced behaviours no longer pay off, we are likely to abandon and replace them with more successful ones. Positive reinforcement: a stimulus is added to increase the likelihood of a response (i. e. , behaviour): your boss gives you a bonus after you work hard, a child gets a dessert after eating dinner. An aversive stimulus is removed to increase the likelihood of a behaviour. The likelihood the boy will clean is increased because cleaning removes the negative stimulus (nagging). Punishment: a response is weakened by the outcomes that follow it. Rat gets a shock (a punisher) when enters a zone; a consequence that weakens a behaviour. Reinforces are defined in terms of their observable effects on behaviour. If the food doesn"t increase lever pushing, then for this rat, food, is not a reinforcer: two types of punishment.
