B.F. Skinner

American psychologist B.F. Skinner is one of the most famous names associated with learning. Like John Watson, he believed that only observable behavior is worth studying. However, Skinner believed operant conditioning is more conclusive to real life, while classical conditioning is limited to existing behaviors. Skinner created a series of lawful processes aimed at explaining or ordering behavior.

Operant conditioning or Skinnerian conditioning explains learning in terms of how behavior is shaped or maintained by its consequences. He created some key terms to describe this process that you should know.

Reinforcement - Reinforcement is what occurs when a stimulus or event follows a behavior, thus increasing the likelihood of the behavior being repeated.
- Positive Reinforcement - the addition of a pleasant stimulus after the desired response. Something is added to increase the likelihood of a behavior being repeated. EX: Receiving a bonus check for meeting your sales quota at work.
- Negative Reinforcement - The removal of something unpleasant or an aversive stimulus. Escaping the aversive stimuli increases the likelihood of the same behavior increasing in the future. The learner has learned to avoid an event or aversive outcome. EX: Taking aspirin to relieve a headache. The headache is the aversive stimuli. Taking aspirin is the behavior that will be increased.

Understanding positive and negative reinforcement can be tricky at times. The thing to remember is just like in math when you see the word positive you are adding something and when you see the term negative taking away something. This does not necessarily correlate to "good" and "bad".

Take a moment to practice this concept by identifying whether each of the events below is an example of positive or negative reinforcement.

Reinforcement Schedules

How often do you reinforce behavior? Is the answer every time the behavior occurs or only some of the time? After conducting many experiments on this topic Skinner found specific arrangements of reinforcement to produce strong patterns of responding or rates of responding.

Continuous Reinforcement - This is when you reinforce the behavior EVERY TIME it occurs. It is most effective during the beginning of learning. With continuous reinforcement, acquisition is quick to take place, but so is extinction.
Partial Reinforcement - This is when you reinforce the behavior only SOME of the time. With partial reinforcement, acquisition comes more slowly, but the behavior is not as easily extinguished. There are four schedules for partial reinforcement.

Learn more about reinforcement schedules in the activity below.

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