PSYA02H3 Chapter 5: Chapter 5.pdf

• School: UTSC
• Department: Psychology
• Course: PSYA02H3
• Professor: John Bassili

Document Summary

Occurs when: a behaviour that has been previously reinforced, no longer results in the reinforcing consequences, therefore, the behaviour stops occurring in the future. Skinner demonstrated extinction with lab animals (pigeon no longer received food as a reinforce for pecking the key, key-pecking behaviour stopped, rat and receiving food by pressing lever) Extinctions in human behaviour: decreasing night time tantrums of young child (tantrums reinforced by parents" attention) Extinctions to stop self-injurious behaviour of mentally retarded child, incorrect math answers. Extinction burst once behaviour no longer reinforced, often increases briefly in frequency, duration, intensity before it decreases and ultimately stops. Extinction burst novel behaviours (behaviours that don"t typically occur in a particular situation) may occur for a brief period when a behaviour is no longer reinforced. Example: when amanda"s parents no longer reinforced her crying at night, she cried longer and louder (increased duration and intensity) but she also screamed and hit her pillow (novel behaviour)