Operant Conditioning

Operant Conditioning

Pamela Combs

PS124: Introduction to Psychology

Kaplan University

June 9, 2014

Operant conditioning is a method of learning base upon a system of rewards and punishments to change behavior. In other words, psychologist use positive and negative reinforcement or positive and negative punishment to change behavior using a basic cause and effect method. Psychologist Edward L. Thorndike was the first to study operant behavior and was later expanded on by psychologist B. F. Skinner. Skinner was a behaviorist that believed that to understand behavior you must look at the causes of actions, and its consequences. Skinner’s theory explains how we acquire the range of learned behaviors we display each and every day.

Two of the four components used in operant conditioning are positive and negative reinforcement, which is used to increase a desired behavior. Positive reinforcement is defined in our text and there is really no better way to explain it, as the strengthening of a response by presenting a typically pleasurable stimulus after the response. (Stangor, 2010, p. 204). An example of using positive reinforcement is that I gave my child a prize after he got a good grade in his class. Another example is that I received praise for doing a good job at work. Ethical concerns when using this method is one might come to expect a reward for the certain desired behavior.

Negative reinforcement is defined as the strengthening of a response by removing a typically unpleasant stimulus after the response (Stangor. 2010, p. 204). An example of negative reinforcement is that our teacher gave us a pass on our quiz this week so we can do a good job on our paper or my kids cleaned their room to avoid me yelling at them. An ethical concern with this method it that if a person does is not successful in their attempts to avoid the negative consequence, they may not never try later attempts in the future.

Positive and negative punishment is the two other...