Human behavior continues to thrive off the power of reinforcement. Reinforcement almost always means that some sort of reward is promoted for the future. This strategy has increased the likelihood of positive behaviors while diminishing the negative ones. For example, when a child knows a new toy is promised if they behave well throughout the school day, they are more likely to be focused on achieving that toy. I can personally say reinforcers had positively worked on me as a child. During one school year when my grades started to slip, my father told me that if I worked hard to get all A’s for the whole year, I would finally get the trampoline I had been begging for. That year I worked twice as hard, because twelve-year-old me really wanted that trampoline! When the end of the year came and I got that final report card with all A’s, it was like I had won a million dollars. I found this article on the different methods and examples of positive reinforcement in operant conditioning. I did not know that there are multiple different names for different types of reinforcers. Natural, tangible, token, and social are just a few types studied.
https://www.verywellmind.com/what-is-positive-reinforcement-2795412
I really liked your opening sentence, "Human behavior continues to thrive off of the power of reinforcement", because it is so true. All of human behavior is motivated through the promise of some type of positive reinforcement. For example, we all go to work every day to receive a pay check (positive reinforcement). I also really liked your personal example of the trampoline. My father now motivates me by paying my car insurance if I continue to get good grades!
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