Theories of reinforcement.

Abstract

D id you know that• reinforcers need not reduce a biological drive or need?• responses, as well as stimuli, can serve as reinforcers?• instrumental conditioning procedures not only increase the rate of the instrumental response, they also decrease the rate of the reinforcing response?• instrumental conditioning procedures restrict how an organism distributes its behavior among its response alternatives?• reinforcement effects are a by-product of the new response choices an organism makes when its activities are constrained by an instrumental conditioning procedure?• the effect of an instrumental conditioning procedure depends on all the activities of a participant and how these activities are organized? An important factor is the availability of substitutes for the reinforcer activity.• behavioral economics developed from efforts to use economic concepts to gain a better understanding of how instrumental conditioning procedures cause a redistribution of behavior among possible response options?In Chapter 8, we discussed various types of instrumental conditioning procedures and their behavioral outcomes. There is no doubt that reinforcement