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effort to maintain homeostasis, to counteract partially the
impact of the drug.
b) Because of this compensatory response, if the drug is taken in
the same manner and in the same environment consistently,
greater doses of the drug are needed to maintain the same
high. If, after doing drugs in the same environment repeatedly,
the drug user does drugs in a new environment, the CS (the
environment) will not be present, and the body will not
produce the compensatory response. Because the body is not
prepared for ingestion of the drug, the drug user is much more
likely to overdose.
4. Harnessing Classical Conditioning
a) Psychoneuroimmunology has emerged to explore the interaction
of psychology, the nervous system, and the immune system.
One goal of psychoneuroimmunology is to allow conditioning
to replace high doses of medications that have serious side
effects. As with drug users for which the environment
becomes a CS, the environment can be associated with
beneficial drugs so that the environment elicits a positive
conditioned response.
III. Operant Conditioning: Learning About Consequences
A. The Law of Effect
1. The Law of Effect, developed by Edward Thorndike, simply states that
behaviors that are followed by pleasant, positive consequences are
likely to increase in frequency
2. For Thorndike, learning involved an association between a stimulus
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and a response, a stimulus–response connection
3. These stimulus–response connections are learned gradually and
mechanistically through blind trial and error
B. Experimental Analysis of Behavior
1. B. F. Skinner outlined a research program called the experimental
analysis of behavior, whose purpose was to discover the ways that
environmental conditions affect the likelihood that a given response
will occur
2. Operant Conditioning procedures were developed by Skinner to allow
the experimental analysis of behavior and modify the probability of
different types of operant behavior as a function of the environmental
consequences they produce
3. An Operant is any behavior that is emitted by an organism and can be
characterized in terms of the observable effects it has on the
environment
C. Reinforcement Contingencies
1. A reinforcement contingency is a consistent relationship between a
response and the changes in the environment that it produces
2. A reinforcer is any stimulus that, when made contingent on a response,
increases the probability of that response
a) A Positive Reinforcer is any stimulus that—when made
contingent on a behavior—increases the probability of that
behavior over time
b) A Negative Reinforcer is any stimulus that, when removed,
reduced, or prevented, increases the probability of a given
response over time
3. Operant Extinction occurs as reinforcement is withheld
4. A Punisher is any stimulus that—when it is made contingent on a
response—decreases the probability of that response over time.
a) A Positive Punisher is when a behavior is followed by the
delivery of an aversive stimulus
b) A Negative Punisher is when a behavior is followed by the
removal of an appetitive, or positive, stimulus
5. Punishment always reduces the probability of a response occurring
6. Reinforcement always increases the probability of a response occurring
7. Discriminative Stimuli, through their associations with reinforcement
or punishment, come to set the context for that behavior
8. The Three-Term Contingency is the sequence of discriminative stimulus–
behavior–consequence that Skinner believed could explain most human
behavior
9. Behavior analysts assume that behaviors, even apparently self-
destructive and irrational behaviors, persist because they are being
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reinforced
10. Secondary gains are subtle reinforcers, such as attention, sympathy, or
release from responsibility, that reinforce behaviors that may have
obvious associated negative consequences
D. Properties of Reinforcers
1. Primary reinforcers, such as food and water, are reinforcers that are
biologically determined
2. Conditioned reinforcers are otherwise neutral stimuli that have, over
time, become associated with primary reinforcers. Money, grades,
smiles of approval, and gold stars can all act as conditioned
reinforcers.
a) Teachers and researchers often find conditioned reinforcers
more effective and easier to use than primary reinforcers
because:
(i) Few primary reinforcers are available in the classroom
(ii) Conditioned reinforcers can be dispensed rapidly
(iii) Conditioned reinforcers are portable
(iv) The reinforcing effect of conditioned reinforcers may be
more immediate
b) Token economies are contexts, such as psychiatric hospitals
and prisons, in which desired behaviors are explicitly defined
and in which tokens are given by staff for performance of
these behaviors. The tokens can later be redeemed for
privileges or goods.
c) The Premack Principle suggests that a more probable activity
can be used to reinforce a less probable one. According to the
Premack Principle, a reinforcer may be any event or activity
that is valued by the organism.
E. Schedules of Reinforcement
1. Reinforcers can be delivered according to either ratio or interval
schedules. Each of these schedules can be used with a fixed or variable
pattern of reinforcement.
2. The Partial Reinforcement Effect states that responses acquired under
schedules of partial reinforcement are more resistant to extinction than
those acquired with continuous reinfo
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