Effects of Rule Structure and Reward Magnitude on the Acquisition and Adoption of Self-Reward Criteria

Abstract

Summa~y.-This study investigated the effects of rule structure and reward magnimde on children's acquisition and adoption of a self-reward criterion that a training agent had either displayed or imposed. A 2 X 2 X 2 X 2 factorial design, with two levels of rule structure, two levels of reward magnitude, two modes of training, and sex differentiation was employed. As predicted, high rule structuring resulted in less rule deviation and more self-rewarding verbalizations than did low rule structuring. However, contrary to prediction, high-reward Ss did not differ significantly from low-reward Ss with respect to the amount of rule violation committed in the training agent's absence.

Children's Adoption of Self-Reward Patterns: Incentive Level and Method of Transmission

“…It was predicted that violation of this rule (i.e., self-administration of one or more tokens for scores of less than 20) would occur less often in the modeling and direct training groups than in the control group. Further, in accord with our previous data (Liebert & Allen, 1967), it seemed likely that modeling and direct training would not differ in their effectiveness.…”

“…Nonetheless, a previous study from our laboratory (Liebert & Allen, 1967) failed to find an effect for the reward associated with plastic tokens in this situation. Our results suggested that offering children unidentified prizes made little difference in their adherence to a self-reward criterion when they performed alone.…”

“…It would also be interesting to determine whether the explicit verbalization of contingency or deservingness enhances the potency of direct training. Previous research (Liebert & Allen, 1967) suggested that both direct training and observation of a model are more effective when the training agent verbalizes the contingency for his performance than when he engages in no verbalizations. A critical question for further investigation of this issue is whether minimal verbalization ("that's a good score") and verbalization of a contingency ("that deserves a chip") are additive when compared with the effects of nonverbalizing training agents, or whether only the expression of contingency is critical.…”

“…Thus, not surprisingly, recent experiments have endeavored to compare the influence of modeling and direct training on the adoption of self-reward criteria (Bee & Colle, 1967;Liebert & Allen, 1967). …”

“…An important and interesting aspect of this type of self-control is the self-administration of praise and various material rewards after attaining some minimum level of performance. Thus, several recent studies have examined the immediate antecedents of the acquisition and adoption of self-reward criteria by children (e.g., Bandura, Grusec, & Menlove, 1967a;Bandura & Whalen, 1966;Bee & Colle, 1967;Liebert & Allen, 1967;Mischel & Liebert, 1966. These investigations have shown that various characteristics of the training agent and his interaction with the subject (e.g., nurturance, power, inconsistencies in training) may affect This study was supported by a U.S. Office of Education grant OEG-2-7-070002-3005.…”