Unit 2, PSY 4600

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Unit 2, PSY 4600

• Schedule
• Today and Thursday Lecture
• Tuesday, 9/29 Exam

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Schedule, U3

• I will be away at a conference from Wednesday,
  9/30 Sunday, 10/4
• But, have no fear, Jeana Koerber will lecture on
  Thursday, 10/01
• I will have access to email, but will not be
  checking it on a regular basis
• If you have questions/concerns during that time,
  contact Julie, Nate, or Dane, or wait until I
  return

(Daytona Beach, Sarah is also going to be away)
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Last unit Respondent Behavioral Relations
S---gtR US---gtUR CS---gtCRThis
unit Operant Behavioral Relations
MOSD/S?R---gtScFocus on operant consequences
and SDs and S?s
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SO 2 Basic Behavioral Principles

• Reinforcement
• A. Positive
• B. Negative (difference between pos neg?)
• 1. Escape (alarm clock, safety harness/belt)
• 2. Avoidance (child plays quietly)
• Punishment
• Operant Extinction (withheld, not withdrawn)

Examples on page 17 of the Study Objectives
(terminates or avoids, TV screen clears, food
reinforcement, avoid vs. pun, extinction burst,
taking truck away, sending a child from the table)
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SO 2 Examples (in SOs)

• Rafael gets a muscle cramp. He massages the
  muscle and the cramp immediately decreases in
  severity. As a result, when Rafael gets a muscle
  cramp in the future, he massages it more often
  than he had done in the past.
• A student wants to make a copy. He/she inserts
  her Bronco Card into a copy machine and pushes
  the button. No copies are made. The student
  pushes and pushes the button, but still no copies
  are made. As a result, the student pushes the
  copy button on that machine less often.

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SO 2 (Examples, cont.)

• Barbara calls her little sister a scardy cat and
  the little sister immediately begins to cry. As a
  result, Barbara calls her sister a scardy cat
  more often in the future.
• A worker is standing around with co-workers and
  puts on her hard hat before entering the
  construction area. Her supervisor sees this and
  immediately says Hey, thats great, Grace!
  Thanks for making safety first a reality! As a
  result, Grace puts on her hard hat less often in
  the future.

(effect on behavior, cant just look at the
conseq teachers and elementary school children ,
criticism,attention)
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SO 2 Final Example

• Jake gets bitten by bugs when he walks in the
  woods. One day, he puts on a new kind of bug
  repellant and does not get bitten by bugs. As a
  result, in the future, he puts on that new kind
  of bug repellant before he walks in the woods
  more often.

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SO 3 Abbreviations Unconditioned and
Conditioned Reinforcers
Unconditioned Reinforcer SR NOT UR
URUnconditioned Response Conditioned
Reinforcer Sr NOT CR CRConditioned Response
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SO 4 Introduction

• Unit starts with animal training
• Dolphin training, e.g., Shedd Aquarium, San Diego
  Sea World, Georgia Aquarium
• Behavioral enrichment in zoos, e.g., Honolulu
  Zoo, Atlanta Zoo, Brookfield Zoo, Disney Land and
  Disney World
• Animal training (dogs, cats, show horses, etc.),
  Karen Pryor (Dont shoot the dog), Mary Burch
  Jon Bailey (How dogs learn), Gillette Obedience
  Training (Galesburg, MI)
• Clicker Training Clicker as an Sr (athletes)

(Binti Jua Brookfield zoo, Jeremy Smiedendorf,
intern mammal training, Disney, GA aquarium, dive
master,GIT)
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SO 4 The Aggressive Bull ElephantSan Diego Zoo

• An aggressive elephant
• Husbandry includes cutting off calluses on feet,
  otherwise, eventually they cant walk
• G. Priest established a click as an Sr
• Shaped the elephant to walk to a wall with hole
  in it, put its foot through the hole, and stand
  patiently while the vet cut off the calluses.

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SO 4 Development and Testing of an Sr
Development
When food deprived (MO/EO)
NS (click)
/ SR (carrot) (no behavior is necessary!)
NS becomes an Sr

• Critical features
• The NS is paired with an SR (or Sr) (NOT a US!)
• The NS precedes the SR when pairing takes place
• No behavior is necessary
• The NS becomes an Sr (NOT a CS!)

(How trainers made click all in SOs,click,
crticial features on slide - not for the exam,
need to test)
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SO 4 Development and Testing of an Sr
Testing
When food deprived (MO/EO)
R (any response) ----gt Sr (click)
If R increases in frequency, the NS has become
an Sr

• Critical features
• The Sr follows the response (operant relation)
• The Sr is presented alone (not with the SR)
• The R must increase in frequency in the future
• The Sr must occasionally be paired with the SR

(essential - if the R doesnt increase, no
reinforcer, click critical features)
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SO 4 Sample question
Assume a parent wants to use stroking a babys
forearm as a conditioned reinforcer to cooing
behavior of the baby. That is, the parent wants
to increase vocalizations of the baby using a
stroke to the babys forearm as a conditioned
reinforcer. The stroke is not an Sr to begin with.

• Diagram what the parent should do to make the
• stroke into a conditioned reinforcer,
  labeling all
• parts of the diagram with the correct
  behavioral
• terms.

B. Now diagram what the parent should do in
order to make sure the stroke of the arm
really has become a conditioned reinforcer.
Do diagram this procedure, labeling each
part with the correct behavioral term.
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SO 5 Difference BetweenRespondent Conditioning
and Development of an Sr

• The confusion Both involve pairing an NS with
  another stimulus
• Difference
• Respondent NS/US, or NS/CS
• Conditioning
• Development NS/SR, or NS/Sr
• of an Sr

(Respondent conditioning NS becomes a CS--gtCR
Sr NS becomes Sr R--gtSr)
(Thought question When will an NS become both a
CS and an Sr?)
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SO 7 Behavioral Enrichment in Zoos

• Behavioral interventions designed to improve the
  well being and health of captive animals
• Hal Markowitz started this work in the 1970s
• Zoos have a very important function protection
  of endangered species, education of public
• keep humans from destroying natural habitats
• keep humans from killing off species of animals
  (ivory tusks or furs)
• protect and preserve species that are endangered
  due to disease, natural disasters

(mother nature aint kind Poling story)
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Zoos

• Many of us cringe when we think about zoos
  animals in prison

(but most zoos have come a long way..)
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SO 7 Two approaches zoo officials have tried in
order to make life better for captive critters

• Make the enclosures more naturalistic
• Add toys, boomer balls

Neither terrifically effective toys novelty
wears off, dont play with toys, and
naturalistic settings)
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SO 8 Whats the problem, even when enclosures
are naturalistic?

• Naturalistic enclosures sometimes do have some
  benefits for the animals
• Certainly make us more comfortable

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SO 8 Whats the problem, even when enclosures
are naturalistic?

• Fail to include the behavioral contingencies in
  the wild that evoke and reinforce species typical
  (and active) behavior in the wild
• Much of the behavior of free-ranging animals
  involves getting food (the only one mentioned by
  Chance), fighting off or fleeing predators,
  natural migration, securing mates and mating,
  establishing social hierarchies, etc.
• Its the consequences of those behaviors that
  maintain much of the active behavior of wild
  animals
• some behavior is, of course, genetic
• over the years, they have discovered, however,
  that many behaviors that were once considered
  inherited are learned

(most groups, dominant male stallions, mares
gorillas ducklings following Mom closeness to
object, following in the natural environment,
birds songs)
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SO 8 Whats the problem, even when enclosures
are naturalistic?

• In zoos, food is provided usually in the same
  place at the same time each day, animals are
  completely protected from predators, certainly
  cannot migrate to different locations, and are
  not subjected to threats of their domination from
  outside animals (stallions, gorillas)
• There is no reason for animals to be active
• Behaviorally the reason to be active
• R (species typical active behaviors) ? SR
• What happens if behaviors are not followed by
  reinforcement?

(in a zoo, no one wants to see an antelope/Bambi
killed, mauled, and eaten by a hyena)
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Toys and boomer balls, but no reinforcement for
playing with them
Great enclosures, but no reinforcement for
active behaviors
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Examples of Behavioral Enrichment

• Servals

(Who cant love a face like this? ClickServals
swim in the wild naturalistic enclosures
included ponds servals didnt swim. Guess what
was missing?)
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Enrichment for ServalsHonolulu Zoo
Species typical behavior with same reinforcement
as in the wild (food)
(not squirmish about dead fish only dead
mammals click 5-gallon ice, cross-species)
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Enrichment for Elephants Honolulu Zoo
Species typical behavior with same reinforcement
as in the wild (food)
(variation on the same theme elephant keggers
not beer!)
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Enrichment for Langor MonkeysHonolulu Zoo
Species typical behavior (grooming and foraging)
with reinforcement
(mop head on bungee cord, laced with fruit loops)
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Enrichment for Chimps Honolulu Zoo
Species typical behavior (manipulating sticks,
using them as tools) with reinforcement
(research on sticks, dont play with them, yet in
the wild chimps use them as tools, get very
creative Termite mound, with gruel of bananas,
oatmeal, pb, honey, Hawaiin punch put the
caps in different places/holes intermittent
ratio reinforcement schedule)
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SO 9 Delusions, hallucinations

• Chance presents a number of very interesting
  cases
• Delusions and hallucinations - seeing, hearing
  things that arent really there (little green
  men, voices, etc.)
• Sometimes they are organic or have physiological
  causes - brain injury, Alzheimers disease, drugs
  - sometimes they may be due to operant
  conditioning, but
• They often can be altered by operant conditioning
  procedures.

(back to humans!)
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SO 9A What was reinforcing the delusional
behavior that her head was falling off?

• Woman in a mental institution who believed her
  head was falling off.
• She seemed quite frightened when this was
  occurring and the staff immediately tried to calm
  her down.
• The delusion got worse - she began to hear
  popping noises right before her head was going
  to fall off.

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SO 9A Cont.

• Behavioral psychologists observed
• She had difficulty approaching staff and engaging
  them in conversation.
• She had poor social skills so when she did
  approach them, the staff responded with
  annoyance.
• When her head was falling off or when she heard
  popping sounds prior to her head falling off, the
  staff paid attention to her and comforted her.

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SO 9B Intervention components

• Solution?
• Taught her better social skills
• Taught staff to reinforce her appropriate
  (actually, better) social behaviors
• Taught staff to extinguish any behavior related
  to her head falling off
• Result?
• Her head remained firmly attached to her body.

(Very nice ethical procedure - next slide)
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SO 9C Why is this such a nice example of an
ethical intervention?

• Social interaction with staff was a powerful Sr
  for her as evidenced by her delusional behaviors
  (popping sounds, head falling off)
• If they had only extinguished (not to mention
  punished) the delusional behavior, it would have
  deprived the woman of an important reinforcer for
  her - decreasing her quality of life
• Provided that reinforcer for her by teaching her
  appropriate social behaviors that resulted in
  that same powerful reinforcer, thus preserving
  her quality of life .

(standard practice, dignity respect for clients)
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SO 10 The Haggly Old Witch

• Patient was a young male schizophrenic in the
  psychiatric hospital
• Presenting problem A haggly old witch kept
  following him around.
• Medication helped, but he continued to report
  that she was dogging him
• Intervention Record the strength of his belief
  that the witch was really there on a 100-point
  rating scale.
• 100 Absolutely, positively certain
• 0 Witch is not there, its my imagination

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SO 10

• Reinforced expressions of doubt
• After 26 days, the patient consistently reported
  that the witch was all in his imagination!
• Think of the implications - the intervention
  consisted of simply reinforcing the verbal
  behavior of the client, and it changed his
  reality.

(U5VB, nonrequired Elizabeth Loftus, memory is
highly malleable, expert witness, entire
events Can be planted in a persons memory -
young child, shaking hands with bugs bunny. At
Disney Land, bugs bunny inappropriate behavior)
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SO 11
But how do we know that the schizophrenic patient
really believed that the witch was no longer
following him? How do we know that the patient
simply wasnt telling the therapist what he knew
the therapist wanted to hear?
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SO 11

• The patient always took a certain tranquilizer
  when he believed the haggly old witch was there
• The therapist recorded the number of
  tranquilizers the patient took, using an ABAB
  reversal design
• Surely enough, during treatment, he did not take
  as many tranquilizers, and at the end of
  treatment he wasnt taking any.

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(No Transcript)
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Meyerson Michael SDs and S?s

• Definitions SDs and S? (not for the exam)
• My definition for this class (in SO 12)
• A stimulus that precedes a response and evokes
  that response because that particular response
  has been reinforced in its presence and not in
  its absence.
• Malotts definition
• A stimulus in the presence of which a response
  has been reinforced or punished.
• Carrs/Pietras definition
• An event that precedes an operant and sets the
  occasion for the behavior. They change the
  probability of behavior based on a history of
  differential reinforcement.

(animation of this study on Dougs web site, link
is on my web page)
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SO13 Development and Testing of an SD
Development/Training dolphin to jump and back
flip immediately after seeing a hand signal but
not in its absence
SD (hand signal)
R (jump and back flip)
---gtSR (food)
S? (no hand signal)
R (jump and back flip)
---gtExt (no food)
Testing After repeated SD and S? training above,
will the dolphin jump and do a back flip ONLY
after the hand signal?
SD (hand signal) R (jump and back
flip)
S? (no hand signal) NO R (does not
jump/back flip)
(both SD and S? training necessary)
(no ext in s? testing)
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SO13 SD/S? Another Example
Development/Training rat to press a lever
immediately when a light is on and ONLY when the
light is on.
Testing After repeated SD and S? training above,
will the rat press the lever ONLY after the light
on?
SD (light on) R (press lever)
S? (no light) NO R (no lever press)
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SOs 14 15 Two Important Issues About SDs

• SDs immediately evoke a response - within 5 - 60
  sec after the SD occurs.
• They do NOT increase the future frequency of a
  response. Only consequences affect the future
  frequency of a response. (-1 on exam)
• SDs precede responses
• They do NOT precede other stimuli, e. g., yellow
  light and red light.

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SOs 17-25 Meyerson Michael, Introduction

• MM developed a procedure to test the hearing of
  nonverbal children diagnosed with developmental
  disabilities. Ingenious procedure.
• Typical hearing test requires that individuals
  have a verbal repertoire, that is, have language
• Developed before federal regulations required
  such hearing tests
• Dickinsons experience - ten years after the
  article, undiagnosed hearing problem with child
  who had spent 3 years in a mental institution

(Meyerson, deaf, rehabilitation psychology,Blough
technique)
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Lee Meyerson
Jack Michael
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Meyerson Michael Description Overview

• Ultimate goal/hearing test
• Pull the right lever when the child heard a tone
• Pull the left lever when he/she did NOT hear a
  tone
• Why pull left lever when he/she did NOT hear a
  tone?

(answer not on slide)
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Meyerson Michael, Overview cont.

• Three 30-min phases
• Stimulus discrimination training (SD/S? training)
• Stimulus fading and stimulus generalization
  (bringing lever pulling under the control of the
  critical stimuli - tone on/tone off)
• Hearing test

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Basic MM Apparatus
Left Light
Right Light
Left Lever
Right Lever
Reinforcement Dispenser Tray
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SO 18 Phase 1 Two Discriminations Right Lever
Pull and Left Lever Pull
Right Lever Pull SD R1 ------------------gt
SR/Sr (VR8 schedule) Tone on (500 cps, 40
dbl) Right lever pull Edibles R
light on, L light off Trinkets
S? R1 ------------------gt EXT Tone
off Right lever pull No
edibles R light off, L light on No
trinkets Left Lever Pull SD R2 --------------
----gt SR/Sr (VR8 schedule) Tone off Left
lever pull Edibles R light off, L
light on Trinkets
S? R2 ------------------gt EXT Tone
on (500 cps, 40 dbl) Left lever pull
No edibles R light on, L light off
No trinkets
(VR8 schedule-SO20 Nxt slide. If pulled wrong
lever, reset the VR8 schedule for that lever)
(SO19 two SD/S? disc, two responses. Three
stimuli for SD and S?)
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NFE MM Reinforcement Schedule

• Technical Name VR8
• Reinforcement provided after an average of 8
  responses
• In this case, lever pulls
• What type of response pattern does it generate?
• Why did MM use this schedule?

(answers not on slide)
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SO19 Why are there two discriminations?

• A discrimination consists of both an SD and S?
  for a particular response
• A response occurs more frequently in the
  presence of the SD than in the presence of the S?
• There were two responses each with an SD and S?
• Right level pull
• SD (tone on, R light on, L light off)
• S? (tone off, R light off, L light on)
• Left lever pull
• SD (tone off, R light off, L light on)
• S? (tone on, R light on, L light off)

Note carefully it is NOT because the SD and S?
are made up of more than one stimulus the
critical issue is that there two different
responses, each with an SD and S?
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SO 20, Phase 2, Stimulus Fading

• Gradually made the lights over the two levers
  dimmer and dimmer until they would no longer
  light up)
• Not for the exam
• But why did MM use the lights as stimuli in the
  first phase if they were just going to fade them
  out in the second phase?

(both stimulus fading and generalization, 2nd
training answer not on slide next slide,
discriminations after training)
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Phase 2 Discriminations after Stimulus Fading of
Lights
Right Lever Pull SD R1 ------------------gt
SR/Sr (VR8) Tone on Right lever pull
Edibles Trinkets S?
R1 ------------------gt EXT Tone
off Right lever pull No edibles
No trinkets Left Lever
Pull SD R2 ------------------gt SR/Sr
(VR8) Tone off Left lever pull
Edibles Trinkets S? R2 --------
----------gt EXT Tone on Left lever
pull No edibles No trinkets
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SOs 21 22 Phase 2 Generalization Training

• Phase 1 one tone, a 500 cps tone
• Phase 2 tones of different frequencies presented
  in sequence (300, 400, 500, 600, 700)

Why was this stimulus generalization training
necessary?
During phase 1, pulling the right lever was
reinforced only after a 500 cps tone was
presented. Wanted SD (any tone) R (right
lever pull) SD (no tone) R (left lever
pull) But SD (only 500 cps tone) R (right
lever pull) SD (no tone or any other tone) R
(left lever pull)
(expect stimulus fixation, DD and autistic, mom
new hair cut, dad, new glasses)
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SO 23 Meyerson Michael Hearing Test

• Presented different tones, different loudness in
  steps of 5 to 10 decibles
• What lever would the child pull if a 700 cps tone
  at 100 dbls was presented and the child could
  hear it?
• What lever would the child pull if a 700 cps tone
  at 40 dbls was presented but the child could not
  hear it?

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SO24 SDs S?

• Assume in MM during training, a tone is
  presented, and the child pulls the left lever (a
  mistake - more technically, the response has
  not come under the appropriate stimulus control).
  
• The tone is what type of stimulus for the left
  lever pull?
• Another example
• Suppose Mom is teaching her young child the
• alphabet. She reinforces M when she holds up
• a picture of the letter M. She extinguishes any
  
• other verbal response, like N.
• The picture M is what type of stimulus for the
• vocal response of N?

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SO 25 Automaticity of Reinforcement, MM

• Even though the children did not have verbal
  behavior (language), they quickly acquired the
  appropriate discriminations, even though the
  procedures are, indeed, rather complicated and
  difficult to explain.
• Strong evidence for the automaticity of
  reinforcement, that is, individuals do not have
  to be able to describe, understand, or be aware
  of the relationship between the SDs, S?s, and
  consequences in order for their behavior to be
  affected by them.
• Note carefully, it is not the behaviors they are
  unaware of the point is that they are unaware
  of the conditioning process the conditioning
  process works without awareness of the individual.

(parents, teachers, informed consent, never work,
Maria, if time)
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SO 16 Evoke, Dickinson/Malott vs. Carr
Pietras??

• Simple rule USs evoke URs, CSs evoke CRs
• and SDs evoke Rs

Critical features (you do not have to memorize
these)

• Only antecedent stimuli can evoke
• Organisms do not evoke responses
• Behaviors do not evoke consequences
• Reinforcement does not evoke behaviors

• Only responses can be evoked by stimuli

(evoke vs elicit - nxt slide)
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SO 17 Evoke vs. Elicit

• Similarities
• Only (antecedent) stimuli elicit and evoke
• Only responses can be evoked
• Differences
• Elicit is used ONLY in respondent relations,
  e.g., USs elicit URs, CSs elicit CRs
• Evoke can be used in either respondent or operant
  relations, e.g.,
• USs evoke URs, CSs evoke CRs, SDs evoke Rs

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THE END

• Questions?
• See my web page for animated illustration of MM
• Instructional assistance hours, Monday, Sept. 28,
  400-530
• Dane will be conducting them