January 2010 Archives

What I would like you to do - using the format we have for the other video assignments - find a video that includes both reinforcement and punishment. Break it down into the ABCs and discuss the videos in behavioral terms.

 

 

Please use this to comment on your reading for sec 2.2. I'll leave it up to you about what and how you would like to comment, however I would ask that you attempt to write using behavioral terms. I will also use this as a way to 'time stamp' that you read the section on or before Thursday.

Let me know if you have any questions,

--Dr. M

What I would like you to do for this homework is to have some fun and find some websites of a topic that interests you and that relates to behavior modification. Please try to incorporate the behavioral terms we are learning into your writing.

1) Please discuss your topic in general, why it interests you and how it relates to behavior modification.

2) Post at least 2 links to the sites you visited that were most informative about your topic. For each site discuss the information you found and how it relates to your topic (please don't just say they discussed positive reinforcement - how do they go about it? etc?).

3) Discuss how these sites further expanded your understanding of your topic of interest (kind of like a conclusion).

4) Make a list of behavioral terms you used in this post (this is to help get you focused on using behavioral terms in your regular writings).

Thanks. 

Please use this to comment on your reading for sec 2.3. I'll leave it up to you about what and how you would like to comment, however I would ask that you attempt to write using behavioral terms. I will also use this as a way to 'time stamp' that you read the section on or before Friday. I realize that the Thursday and Friday due dates are close together. If you want you can turn in your Friday assignments in on Saturday.

Please include a list at the end of the behavioral terms you used in the comment you posted.

Let me know if you have any questions,

--Dr. M

For this assignment please find a short video clip online where punishment is occurring. Based on what we covered in class so far, I would like you to identify the ABC's (These should be listed out A=; B=; and C=). The main behavior involved in the video, the antecedents to the behavior, and the consequences of the behavior using the terms and terminology we have learned from the book, class, and other sources.

Remember we are looking for punishment - the behavior (B) has to decrease in the future as a result of the consequence (C).

Keep these questions in mind when formulating your response. Is there an establishing operation involved? Any discriminitive stimulus? What is the context? Is it positive or negative punishment? Who / what is eliciting the behavior? Who is emitting it? Etc.? 

Use these questions when you formulate your video repsonse - don't simply answer each questions.

Finally, please make a list of the behavioral terms used in your response.

This is due Saturday - however since the Thursday and Friday due dates are so close together I changed the due date.

Let me know if you have any questions,

--Dr. M

http://www.farmville.com

Basic Premise: Plant crops and harvest them to earn money and experience points which will allow you to develop your own personal farm complete with livestock, decorations, equipment, and a home of your choosing.

ABC's-Basic Premise: This farm game offers numerous rewards in order to overtly reinforce people into continuing to play the game for enjoyment purposes (it still makes money through advertisements).  However, it also uses covert behavior modification to increase the likelihood that you will use your credit card to purchase "Farmville Cash" to purchase even cooler buildings, vehicles, and decorations for your farm.  After you realize how long it takes to build a huge farm, why not spend a few bucks to greatly cut down on your time?  After all, time is money...and they'd like some of yours.

What are the ABC's involved with this program? Do you think it is behaviorally sound?

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2010/01/26/nashville-to-help-homeles_n_437825.html

What are the producers of this video trying to do? What is the target behavior? How would a behaviorist describe what is going on here? Do you think it is effective?

Here is the writeup on Huffington - http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2010/01/22/the-pumps-without-crap-fu_n_432925.html

If you were to leave a comment on the Huffington site what would you say?

It might be easier to just follow the 5 second rule : -)

What are the ABC's here? How would a behaviorist explain this?

For this assignment please find a short video clip online where punishment is occurring. Based on what we covered in class so far, I would like you to identify the ABC's. The main behavior involved in the video, the antecedents to the behavior, and the consequences of the behavior using the terms and terminology we have learned from the book, class, and other sources.

Keep these questions in mind when formulating your response. Is there an establishing operation involved? Any discriminitive stimulus? What is the context? Is it positive or negative punishment? Who / what is eliciting the behavior? Who is emitting it? Etc.? 

Use these questions when you formulate your video repsonse - don't simply answer each questions.

Finally, please make a list of the behavioral terms used in your response.

This is due Friday - however since the Thursday and Friday due dates are so close together you can send this in on Saturday if you like.

Let me know if you have any questions,

--Dr. M

 

Please use this to comment on your reading for sec 2.1. I'll leave it up to you about what and how you would like to comment, however I would ask that you attempt to write using behavioral terms. I will also use this as a way to 'time stamp' that you read the section on or before Friday. I realize that the Thursday and Friday due dates are close together. If you want you can turn in your Friday assignments in on Saturday.

Please include a list at the end of the behavioral terms you used in the comment you posted.

Let me know if you have any questions,

--Dr. M

What I would like you to do for this homework is to have some fun and find some websites of a topic that interests you and that relates to behavior modification. Please try to incorporate the behavioral terms we are learning into your writing.

1) Please discuss your topic in general, why it interests you and how it relates to behavior modification.

2) Post at least 2 links to the sites you visited that were most informative about your topic. For each site discuss the information you found and how it relates to your topic (please don't just say they discussed positive reinforcement - how do they go about it? etc?).

3) Discuss how these sites further expanded your understanding of your topic of interest (kind of like a conclusion).

4) Make a list of behavioral terms you used in this post (this is to help get you focused on using behavioral terms in your regular writings).

Thanks. 

Please use this to comment on your reading for sec1.5. I'll leave it up to you about what and how you would like to comment, however I would ask that you attempt to write using behavioral terms. I will also use this as a way to 'time stamp' that you read the section on or before Thursday.

Let me know if you have any questions,

--Dr. M

"After multiple re-watchings of the Legally Blonde film series, we knew that sorority sisters enjoy dressing alike, but we never realized how strict the undergrad stylistas were! IvyGate received seven pages of the supposed dress code requirements for Pi Phi's Cornell chapter."

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2010/01/22/sorority-sisters-fashion_n_433491.html

This is a great video one of Kim's student's sent her for her motivation class. How would a behaviorist discuss the role or function of an inspirational speech? Do you think it might be an establishing operation or what?

 

For the next few weeks as part of the class you will be asked to keep track of the food you are eating. For the first week we will conduct a baseline of the food you are eating. You will probably need to carry a small note pad or something manageable to record eating. It should be something that you can carry around since eating takes place in a variety of settings.

You will need to record the time, date and what you ate. Please try to estimate the number of calories you consumed as well. Do the best you can. Please also note the context (antecedent) of the eating behavior. For example I was at my friends house, we were out having fun, for lunch at school, I was busy with my homework....

Please make the recordings as soon as possible so you don't forget what you ate or forget the circumstances.

We will do this for a week and turn in the baseline recordings this coming Tuesday in class.

Please let me know if you have any questions about the class project,

 

--Dr. M

For this assignment please find a short video clip online. Based on what we covered in class on Thursday, I would like you to identify the main behavior involved in the video, the antecedents to the behavior, and the consequences of the behavior using the terms and terminology we have learned from the book, class, and other sources. If you can, tell us if it is reinforcement or punishment and what you base that on (why). When you post make sure you 1) first describe the video in regular lay terms, 2) describe it in behavioral terms (ABCs - use as many of the terms we have already learned so far), 3) is it reinforcement or punishment, and 4) Post the url.

Use the numbering when you make your post.

I will provide an example in a comment below....

 

How does this relate to what we are learning about behavior?

 

"The Commitment Contract concept is based on two well known principles of behavioral economics:

1.People don't always do what they claim they want to do, and
2.Incentives get people to do things"

http://www.stickk.com/

What is this site about? What behavioral principles do they use? Do you think this is a good site? What could you do to imporve on it?

 

"Bigger isn't necessarily better, especially when you want to live sustainably. At least that's what these small home enthusiasts live by. Giving up the luxury of space, tiny-home owners and builders opt instead for a more eco-friendly, less resource intense way of living. By building homes with high ceilings and planting them in open spaces, they still maintain the illusion of space around them. These homeowners are using less heat, electricity and raw materials -- and they might just make you reconsider how important space really is to you. What do you think-- could you live in a 10 by 10 foot space?"

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2010/01/18/the-worlds-tiniest-homes_n_425400.html?slidenumber=3uc%2Bv%2BgZERo%3D&&&slideshow

What do you think about these small houses? How would the alter / modify a person's behavior that lived there? What kind of changes might a person go through living in a small home?

"Stack didn't know how to "manage" a company, but he did know about the principals of competition and democracy: keeping score, having fun, providing choice, and having a voice. With these principals he created his own style of management -- open-book management. He had a dream to create a business of business people. Stack realized that the payoff would be enormous: a company that was consistently able to outperform the market."

http://www.greatgame.com/

I have read the book and recommend it to anyone interested in applying behavioral principles to business. This is not IO - it is about making work fun and challenging using what works behaviorally.

What do you think about the site? Read the book or another one they have in their books store (http://www.greatgame.com/bookstore/bookstore.php?category=2) - write a report for extra credit if you like. Keep in mind you can probably get these usedon Amazon.

"Nutricate Corporation is a technology-enabled health and wellness solutions company founded in Santa Barbara in 2004. Nutricate, meaning "to nutritionally educate", helps consumers make smarter choices. Nutricate aspires to help individuals make managing a healthy lifestyle fun, easy & rewarding."

http://www.nutricate.com/

What is up with this site? How does it differ from the ones I just posted? What behavioral principles are used with this program? Do you think this will be a success?

"It's simple: join or organize a pool with friends or co-workers, or set up a pool for your favorite charity. Everyone puts their money into escrow (there is no "house" cut). After a pre-arranged period of time, whoever's closest to his or her target weight*, percentagewise, takes the pot."

http://www.makemoneylosingweight.com/

What is this about? Is it legit? What behavioral principles are they using to help people lose weight?

"Shedding those extra winter pounds can be a struggle. But some new websites can help you get motivated by making it a bit of a game. How about challenging others to a weight loss race? If you're betting to lose, all it costs is time and commitment. (news write up from cbs: http://cbs2chicago.com/health/Shed.Pounds.Faster.2.984102.html)"

Linke to Fat Bet: http://www.Fatbet.net

What is this site all about? How does it work? What behavioral strategies do they use to help people lose weight? Are they making it fun?

 

What I would like you to do for this homework is to have some fun and find some websites of a topic that interests you and post it here as a comment. At this point I am not as concerned with exactly how you compose the actual post for this activity. I am more concerned that you have a meaningful experience searching out and learning about your topic.

Thanks. 

Extra assistance is available this month through Quitline Iowa and the UNI Employee Wellness Program. Quitline Iowa (1-800-784-8669) will provide four weeks (rather than its usual two) of nicotine replacement therapy and UNI will provide another two weeks for employees participating in its Tobacco Cessation Program. Contact Kathy.Green@uni.edu, 3-6921.

If you want to quit somking or chewing behaviors, you can get some assistance. If you want to document it you can get class credit.

Or if you just want to find out how the program works - you can get credit for that as well...

After watching the fun theory videos I thought, what a cool idea. The only problem I had with it was they were kind of novelty ideas.  I dont think people would keep coming back to the bottle return game after the first couple of times because the other collection facilities are probably more efficient and the people were out returning bottles anyway.  the stairs were cool but I think the fun would wear off from the people who commute through that station daily.  Really cool though. 

Obesity Research

Obesity has become as serious a contributor to the burden of disease and shortening of healthy life as smoking, according to new work published this week in American Journal of Preventive Medicine. Another recent study published in the New England Journal of Medicine found that health effects from obesity may soon overtake improvements to the average lifespan resulting from declines in smoking. We'll get the latest on research into obesity, and talk about weight and health.

http://www.sciencefriday.com/program/archives/201001082

What are some of the environmental factors of obesity? What are the cosequences of obesity? How is obesity measured? What are lifestyle behaviors? What are some of the suggestions on how to change these behaviors?

(Also read http://www.cbc.ca/health/story/2010/01/06/obesity-smoking-public-health.html)

 

How do behavioral principles transfer into virtual space? How do we learn how to interact in a new virtual environment? Are virtual spaces operant chambers? How is a cash economy different from a token economy?

http://www.entropiauniverse.com/