3.8 Operant Conditioning

Explain how operant conditioning applies to behavior and mental processes. UNIT 3 Development and Learning

• Operant conditioning focuses on associating consequences (reinforcement and punishment) with behaviors. The Law of Effect states that behaviors with reinforcing consequences are more likely to be repeated while behaviors with punishing consequences are not as likely to be repeated.
• Reinforcement and punishment can be positive or negative. Reinforcers can be primary or secondary. Reinforcement discrimination and generalization have been demonstrated in studies of operant conditioning.
• Reinforcement can be used to shape behavior (“shaping”) gradually through rewarding successive approximations of the desired behavior. Research with animals shows that only certain behaviors can be shaped through reinforcement (known as instinctive drift).
• Superstitious behavior occurs when consequences reinforce unrelated behaviors. Learned helplessness occurs when organisms learn that they have no control over their experience of aversive consequences in a given situation.
• The schedule with which reinforcement is delivered can determine the strength of the association between the consequence and the response. The two main types of reinforcement schedules are continuous and partial. Each type of reinforcement behavior can be graphed, resulting in a distinctive pattern on the graph (e.g., fixed-interval schedule produces a scalloped graph).
  • i. Continuous reinforcement schedules deliver reinforcement for each and every correct behavior.
  • ii. The partial reinforcement schedules focus on whether reinforcement is delivered on a time-based schedule (fixed- or variableinterval) or for the number of behaviors performed (fixed- or variable-ratio).