Talk:Reinforcement

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I'm an educated person, but I find this article virtually incomprehensible. Is there any way to make it clearer for the layperson, Wikipedia's intended audience? I realize that experts will think that it's dumbed-down, but the article is not for the experts. AverageGuy 01:05, 19 Nov 2004 (UTC)

Agreed, this is gobbledegook. We're not all sociology PHDs. BoneyMaloney 05:35, Mar 31, 2005 (UTC)

Is anyone willing to take a stab at simplifying this? If not, I'll try, but would rather leave it to someone more expert in the field. AverageGuy 02:37, 6 Jun 2005 (UTC)

Okay, I'm gingerly giving it a shot. Incidentally, I think the technical-sounding definitions here are not quite right anyway and the references cited (medical dictionary & animal training site) are not authoritative in behavioral psychology. If no one screams, I'll offer some re-workings of various sections over the next few days. –User:Duldan 23 Jun 2005

No one screamed, so I simplified and expanded quite a bit more. If anyone can help with that hack-job table, please do. –Duldan 28 June 2005 20:49 (UTC)

I'll lend a hand in this, I'm a psychology student (put emphasis on first-year though)--Janarius 1 July 2005 03:42 (UTC)

I have added an image that shows the different response rate of between the schedules of reinforcement, but I made it from scratch and does not look professional at all. Someone make or get a better one. Oh, where do I need to simplify? I mean I understand all of this, but I don't know where's the problem.--Janarius 2 July 2005 03:46 (UTC)

Janarius, I like your image. It's sharp & clear. So nice-looking I figured it might be cribbed, at first glance. A few thoughts:
  • The blue line is "FI" but I think you mean "FR"? If it is FR, it would characteristically be a sort of stair-step pattern with a plateau after each reinforcement.
  • For the y-axis label "Cumulative number of responses" might be less ambiguous? (Amount of response could seem like how hard the rat hits the bar.)
  • Could something say that each hatch mark is an occurrence of reinforcement? That could be said down in the caption.
I also like your additions re: gambling, the VI average, money, DRL, & DRA. I disagree with some other changes, but I'll comment on them later. I wanted to reinforce your image-making quickly. Oh, I agree: "Simplify" tag deleted. –Duldan 2 July 2005 22:30 (UTC)
Glad to be of service and I am very grateful for your observations over several of my mistakes. About Fixed ratio: Yes, I know... But then I'll have to explain why and the same about Fixed Interval. (sighs) --Janarius 3 July 2005 01:59 (UTC)
Well I updated my image. But, when I looked there was no change at all. I'll resubmit at a later time. Anyway, Duldan, I followed your recommendations and made the appropriate corrections and also my explanations over why FR is stair-cased and why FI is like that. But, I do need some help for FI. So anyone in psych. please help.--Janarius 5 July 2005 03:41 (UTC)

Contents

[edit] ratio strain

Concerning about ratio strain, I believe the effects were an increase in length of time in post-reinforcement pauses. However, I could not immediately verify because I lended my learning book (Paul Chance, 2003) to a friend. --Janarius 15:24, 20 January 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Quick Thanks

I normally wouldn't do this, but I just wanted to thank the authors of this piece for their clear understanding and articulation. Psychology is something I've studied a great deal of, and it's always frustrating to see this rampant misuse of "positive/negative reinforcement." --AWF

Maybe we should refer psych students to wikipedia instead of our expensive textbooks. But i'm just fooling around.--Janarius 14:23, 1 February 2006 (UTC)

[edit] "The Punishers"

I removed the following section, "The Punishers." It's barely more than an outline of a possible section, it's full of meaningless punctuation (what do those three brackets mean?), and it was in addition put in the middle of another section. As they say at the bottom of the edit page, if you want to experiment, use the sandbox. Once it's complete we can then see if it adds anything to the article.

=== The Punishers ===
Punishment causes the rate of the subject's behavior or extinguish. Positive punishment is addition of something, negative is the removal of something. A dog barking will cease barking when the bark is paired with a positive punisher, i.e. an electric shock. Negaitve punishment is the subtraction of something.
  • need example of negative punishment -- subtracting something causing a subject's behavior to decrease.
{{{
      • needs revision bad and good are not neutral ***

John FitzGerald 04:09, 27 February 2006 (UTC)

[edit] The Reinforcers

And i removed this from "The Reinforcers":

Speaking colloquially, an aversive stimulus is something the animal finds "bad;" its removal is thus a "good" thing from the animal's point of view.

That isn't what an aversive stimulus is. I realize this is an attempt to make the ideas easier too understand, but one of the important points about reinforcement is that it does not require the invocation of mental states. I'm open to argument, though, which is why I preserved the passage here. John FitzGerald 04:08, 27 February 2006 (UTC)


[edit] Examples

This article could really do with some laymans examples. Positive reinforcement, negative reinforcement, etc.

[edit] What about "intermittent reinforcement"?

Article is not well-written and gives no references or citations. KarenAnn 15:54, 25 June 2006 (UTC)

See this diff: [1], which i have just reverted. Circeus 15:40, 26 June 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Response rate

I'm taking out the statement at the beginning of Types of reinforcement recently changed without explanation by an anonymous user to assert that reinforcement may only increase response rate. I think I know what was meant, but if I'm right that only means that the initial definition in the article is superior to the one which appears in Types of reinforcement and there's no point confusing people. Anyway, if people want to restore the statement they're going to have to provide more detail about exactly what they mean. As the statement stands now, it's wrong. John FitzGerald 14:51, 13 November 2006 (UTC)

Looks good to me now, I moved the types of reinforcement section so it's right after the definition. The gap between the definition and the types caused by the schedules made it hard to remember the counterintuitive definition of reinforcement. Plus, I'd say types of reinforcement is more important than schedule and should come first. WLU 15:44, 13 November 2006 (UTC)

[edit] punishment

I'm not sure why punishment is in this article, it should be in punishment. I'm moving it. WLU 13:09, 19 February 2007 (UTC)

I surmised the reason is because there wasn't much info that makes punishment have its own page, but the added info in the new article is good work. Also, I'm going to copy-paste some text from punishment (psychology) into reinforcement in order to briefly explain positive and negative punishment just to keep the context intact.--Janarius 15:06, 19 February 2007 (UTC)
I think the context about reinforcement isn't about reward, but more like behavioural change.--Janarius 15:11, 19 February 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Premack principle

The Premack principle has its own page, but as a specific case of reinforcement, I think it's better off as a heading on this page. Any thoughts? WLU 19:04, 27 February 2007 (UTC)

I believe you are right. It's an aspect of reinforcement and there's no good reason for it to have its own page. John FitzGerald 14:51, 28 February 2007 (UTC)
I guess so, well it is a stub so why not. And merge reinforcement hierarchy too.--Janarius 15:09, 28 February 2007 (UTC)
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