A Theory of RuleGoverned Behavior

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A Theory of Rule-Governed Behavior

• CH 24

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Finishing papers, courses, degrees

• Daunting task
• Well-intentioned plans
• Sometimes things get in the way of completion
• Sometimes finishing is delayed or does not occur
  at all
• Ineffective contingencies

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The PROBLEMProcrastination

• Ill do it after I watch this show on TV
• Ill get to it once I finish ___ (fill in the
  blank)
• I mean to read my assignments
• I mean to get my homework done
• I want to do the necessary work
• I have good intentions

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What if

• Graduate school

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Supervisory System

• What if a system were put in place to manage
  behavior?
• What would be effective?
• How would it work?

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Dillon Malott (1981)

• Problem Attrition in Ph.D. M.A. programs
• Students not completing theses/dissertations
• Most previous research simply documented
  attrition rate or provided correlations between
  program characteristics student success

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Dillon Malott (cont.)

• Major recommendations for training programs from
  previous research (recommendations based on
  subjective impressions)
• Specification of research tasks and performance
  standards
• Meetings with a supervisor
• Deadlines
• Feedback
• Incentives

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So

• Designed a supervisory system for PhD MA
  students
• Designed experiments to test the system

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Dillon Malott (cont.)

• Students research time effort were considered
  inputs (or costs) to the supervisory system
• Receipt of a degree is considered the output (or
  value) of the system

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Dillon Malott (cont.)

• Two preliminary studies
• Studied components of supervisory system and
  found positive and negative points toward a
  letter of recommendation, combined with weekly
  feedback, effectively controlled research
  behavior
• Have shown that points alone are effective
• (Note Other parts of system must be working
  well, including acceptable quality of research,
  cost (time/effort) of supervision time is low,
  other coursework is completed

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Dillon Malott (cont.)

• 34 MA 5 PhD students in an ABA program _at_ WMU 1
  faculty advisor
• Ph.D. students supervised MA students
• 11 dependent variables
• 3 groups

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Dependent Variables

• Individual mtg. attendance (30 min/week)
• Review article (2 articles/week 100
  words/article)
• Data presentation (weekly if implementing
  research)
• Log (optional 125 words ideas, meeting notes)
• Hours (sum minimum of 12/week)
• Output graphs (hours worked/week)
• Writing (formal manuscript write-up 1,000
  words)
• Editing (improved readability)
• Research proposal (200 words problem, setting,
  research recommendations)
• Non-recurring tasks (special applications
  candidacy)
• Large-group mtg. attendance (2 hours/week)

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Point Feedback System

• Positive points if met criterion (3)
• Negative points if did not meet criterion (-3)
• Letters of recommendation included the percentage
  of positive and negative points earned by the
  student
• (they could earn extra credit)

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Experimental Conditions

• Positive negative points
• Positive points
• Feedback
• Instructions only

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Components that could be in effect

• Specification
• Meetings
• Deadlines
• Feedback
• Consequences
• Positive Points
• Negative Points

• These components could be included in an
  individuals system

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Conditions manipulated supervisory system
components in effect
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Supervisor

• Checked all of the tasks to gather data

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Three Groups of Students

• Generating
• Implementing
• Writing

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Experimental Design
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Results
Collapsed data across the experimental conditions
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Additional Comparison

• Compared students involved in the behavioral
  system with other MA students (some in ABA and
  some not)

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Discussion

• Within system No overlap between points system
  and both feedback and instruction conditions
  across all 7 experiments
• Between system B-S students start thesis
  activities sooner, more graduate in less time
• B-S students appreciated quantity and quality of
  feedback

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The PROBLEMProcrastination

• Ill do it after I watch this show on TV
• Ill get to it once I finish ___ (fill in the
  blank)
• I mean to read my assignments
• I mean to get my homework done
• I want to do the necessary work
• I have good intentions

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The SOLUTION????

• The BOSS warned me

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Did the WARNING help?

• Two months later, work still not done

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Solution

• Performance management
• Performance contracting
• or
• Behavioral contracting
• (SYSTEM)

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Performance Contract

• A written rule statement describing the desired
  or undesired behavior, the occasion when the
  behavior should or should not occur, and the
  added outcome for that behavior.

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Performance Management Rules

• Put it in writing

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Behavioral Weekend Reading Writing
Performance Contract
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Performance Management Rules

• Put it in writing
• Have effective performance management
  contingencies

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Ruths Contingencies

• If at least 15 points are earned by Sunday at 5
  pm, Ruth will go out to movie that evening
• If less than 15 points are earned by Sunday at
  5pm, Ruth will work until finished not go to
  movie

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Performance Management Rules

• Put it in writing
• Have effective performance management
  contingencies
• Performance not monitored once a week turns to
  Jell-o

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Behavioral Weekend Reading Writing
Performance Contract
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Performance Management Rules

• Put it in writing
• Have effective performance management
  contingencies
• Performance not monitored once a week turns to
  Jell-o
• Specify the contingencies clearly

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Behavioral Weekend Writing Performance Contract
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Performance Management Contingency ?
After ? Ruth will not lose those 6 points at
meeting
SD Before meeting at 5pm
Behavior Ruth writes 10 PPT slides 5 pages
Before Ruth will lose 6 points at meeting
After Ruth will lose those 6 points at meeting
SD After meeting at 5pm
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What kind of contingency is this? Avoidance of
Loss
After ? Ruth will not lose those 6 points at
meeting
SD Before meeting at 5pm
Behavior Ruth writes 3 pages
Before Ruth will lose 6 points at meeting
After Ruth will lose those 6 points at meeting
SD After meeting at 5pm
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Performance Contract

• A written rule statement describing the desired
  or undesired behavior,
• the occasion when the behavior should or should
  not occur, and
• the added outcome for that behavior.

Contract
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Theory of Rule-Governed Behavior

• Theoretical and somewhat controversial ideas..

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How do rules govern our behavior?

• Remember this is theoretical
• Environment exerts 2 types of control over
  behavior operant and respondent
• Rule control explains influence of indirect
  acting contingencies
• What function or role do rules serve?

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Rule statements function as SDs? Not Likely

• A rule is a description of a behavioral
  contingency
• Function as reinforcement or punishment based
  SDs?
• Absence of rule should serve as an SD but it
  doesnt.
• SD ANALYSIS DOES NOT WORK.

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Example

• You enjoy drinking a smoothie regardless of
  whether someone has given you a rule about how
  much youd enjoy drinking it
• Someone may tell you youll like drinking the
  smoothie, and that may govern behavior, but it
  does not seem to be a reinforcement based SD
• Drinking a smoothie is not under the stimulus
  control of the rule

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Malott suggestsRule statements are establishing
operations

• A rule statement is an establishing operation
  that establishes noncompliance with the rule as
  an aversive motivating condition.

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Example

• You state the following rule to yourself
• If I dont start reading this chapter, Im not
  going to be ready for the quiz.
• After youve stated that rule, your goofing off
  produces an aversive condition.
• The aversive condition (establishing operation)
  is present
• Establishes noncompliance with rule (goofing off)
  as an aversive condition (produces fear,
  quilt, anxiety)
• Begin reading experience a reduction in
  aversive stimulation (what contingency is this?)

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Aversive Condition???

• Guilt
• Anxiety
• Fear
• Nervousness

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So

• Stating the rule and not working is like turning
  on the shock in an escape experiment. Working on
  the assignment is the escape response.
• Just beginning the assignment may reduce the
  aversiveness a bit
• Does this sound familiar????

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Yes!

• This is a direct-acting contingency controlling
  our rule-governed behavior, even when the rule
  describes an indirect-acting contingency.

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Example

• Poor grade on the quiz or even the poor
  performance during the quiz would be too delayed
  from the behavior of studying to be part of a
  direct-acting contingency controlling that
  studying.
• The delayed grade could influence only indirectly.

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Example (cont)

• MT think that all operant control requires
  direct-acting contingencies
• Theorize that the direct-acting contingency is
  the escape contingency based on the learned
  aversive condition that results from your stating
  the rule
• Reduction of aversive stimulation associated with
  non-compliance with the rule is the direct acting
  contingency (escape)
• Begin study to escape or reduce aversive
  stimulation associate with noncompliance with the
  rule

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Myth of Poor Self-Management

• Poor self-management occurs because we cant
  delay our gratification, because immediate
  outcomes control our behavior better than delayed
  outcomes do. So we fail to act in our long-run
  best interest

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The real cause of poor self-management (Malott)?

• Poor self-management results from poor control by
  rules describing outcomes that are either too
  small (though often of cumulative significance)
  or too improbable.
• The delay is not crucial

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Rules that are easy to follow

• Describe outcomes that are both sizable and
  probable.
• The delay is not crucial.

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Rules that are hard to follow.

• Describe outcomes that are either too small
  (though often of cumulative significance) or too
  improbable.
• The delay is not crucial.
• These rules do not act as effective establishing
  operations

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What if this were true?

• If you eat one more bite of ice cream, you will
  gain 50 pounds, your blood pressure will enter
  the danger zone, your arteries will plug with
  plaque, and youll have a mild heart attack. One
  little bite will definitely cause all these
  horrible things however, those horrible things
  wont happen until exactly one year after that
  bite. But remember, just 1 bite will do it.

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Compare small cumulatively significant outcomes

• If you continue eating ice cream and the like,
  you will gradually gain 50 pounds, your blood
  pressure will gradually rise to the danger zone,
  your arteries will gradually plug with plaque,
  and youll be at serious risk for a fatal heart
  attack (not just a mild one).
• Just one more bowl of ice cream, and then Ill
  stop.

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Contingency Tree
MT, p. 418

Direct Acting (Effective lt 60 s)
Not direct Acting (gt 60 s delay)
Outcomes are immediate, probable, and sizable
Indirect Acting (effective)
Ineffective
Outcomes are improbable or small but cumulative
Outcomes probable and sizable, though delayed
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The 3 contingency model of performance management

• The three crucial contingencies are
• The ineffective natural contingency
• The effective, indirect-acting performance-managem
  ent contingency
• The effective, direct-acting theoretical
  contingency

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Example Wednesday is Senior Day at Bi-Lo -----
10 discount
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Alternate View

• The delay does matter
• It is all about choice of response in the
  presence of concurrent schedules of reinforcement
  (Herrnstein)
• Choice of response is based on reinforcer value,
  delay to reinforcement, and sensitivity to change
  in delay to reinforcement
• A person is said to engage in self-controlled
  behavior when he selects the higher valued, more
  delayed reinforcer over the lesser valued though
  more immediate reinforcer
• Psy 417

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Delay Trap
High
Value of a good grade
Value of extra sleep
Reinforcer Value
End of semester
Low
Sunday Monday Night Morning
Time?
Long
Short
From Mazur (1998)