What's in the News?
What I would like you to do is to start applying what we are learning in class to real world matters. Some might ask, "What good is learning psychology if we can't apply it to real world matters?" So that is what we are going to do with this divergence assignment.
What I would like you to do is to either go to NPR (http://www.npr.org/ ), the BBC (http://www.bbc.co.uk/ ) or any news site listed at the bottom of this page (http://www.huffingtonpost.com/ listed in their news sources) and read, watch, or listen to something that is interesting to you and relates to what we have been learning in the class.
Please respond the blog by BRIEFLY telling us what the piece you chose was and why you picked it (what made it interesting for you)? What did you expect to see? What did you find most interesting about the piece?
Next discuss IN DETAIL how it relates to the class using terms, terminology, and concepts that we have learned so far in class.
Include the URL in your post.
Make a list of key terms and concepts you used in your post.
Let me know if you have any questions,
--Dr. M
I read an article that caught my eye titled "Could an Earlier Bedtime Mean a Healthier Weight for Your Kids?" I was interested in this article, because obesity is often linked to excessive eating (calories) and decreased physical activities; I had never heard of sleep as a possible link. Recent research has found that sleep deprivation causes hormonal changes (increased ghrelin). Ghrelin is a hormone that elicits hunger. Babies, as well as children under the age of five, who did not have at least 10 hours of sleep each night were more likely to be overweight/obese five years later (compared to those who did have at least 10 hours of sleep). Sleep deprivation also increases teens' chances of weight-gain.
The article's author suggests that sleep disorders in children may be avoided by establishing a firm bedtime routine. One example given was reading books in bed. This is a calm activity that helps children "wind down" from an exciting day. Here is a breakdown of the ABC's:
A. In the context of nighttime
B. the parent reads with the child in bed
C. resulting in the child falling asleep earlier (receiving more sleep)
Receiving more sleep is desirable, so parents will be more likely to read with their children.
Since C involves adding something (sleep), it is positive.
Since B will increase, it is reinforcement.
Therefore this is positive reinforcement.
Analysis: In the context of nighttime, parents should emit a reading behavior with their children. This reading behavior will elicit sleepiness in the child.
This is positive reinforcement, because a desirable consequence (child sleeping) was added. As a result, this should increase the frequency of parents reading with their children.
This article also mentioned extinction (although not by name). Parents should “be firm with the bedtime routine. The less you deviate from it, the easier it will become. This lets your child know what to expect each night.” If a child is used to having an irregular bedtime, they may resist for awhile. They may ask nicely, cry, or even have a temper tantrum to get their way. This describes an extinction burst. If a parent is not firm with the bedtime every night, the inconsistency will reinforce the child to resist having a bedtime.
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/joanna-dolgoff-md/could-going-to-bed-earlie_b_767425.html
Terms: elicits, desirable, positive reinforcement, emit, consequence, extinction, extinction burst
http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=130732347
The article I chose is about leading kids in school to make healthier food choices without telling them what to do. The article features different techniques in how to guide children’s decisions when it comes to their diet. The different procedures had very interesting outcomes and statistics as to how children changed their behaviors when food was presented to them in a different manner. I chose this article because I figured it would be interesting and the title implied (to me at least) that it would be involving some underlying behavior modification and psychology. What I expected to see from the piece is what I saw and that was the fact that behavior can be modified without people really being aware that it is being modified. What I found most interesting about the article was that the children were in favor of trying to add or ‘hide’ healthier foods within food they already enjoy.
As I mentioned above this relates to our class because of the behavior modification taking place. The goals of the schools are to get the children to make healthier eating choices. By rearranging different things and displays in the lunch line the children emitted healthier choice behaviors, such as choosing white milk over chocolate. Also, the children who were given the nacho and cheese dip were unaware that it had also been altered. Even though they were not aware that they were eating vegetables, they knew something was up, however, they found the experience pleasurable and thus were reinforced for eating healthily without actually realizing it. Some students did realize that there were vegetables in the cheese dip, but did not mind because their behavior of eating the healthy food was also reinforced, like the other students who were not aware of the changes.
The students that were aware of the changes found it clever and creative as well as a good idea to modify the unhealthy eating choices of students. Some other techniques were also used to help modify the behaviors of the students. One of these was shining flattering light on the food choices that were deemed to be healthier. This is an example of discriminative stimulus because the food looks more reinforcing and according to David Just, (an expert from the article) “Taste is a suggestion more than anything else.” Therefore if the food looks more pleasurable or reinforcing it will be because it is mostly a mental thing.
Terms: behavior modification, emitted, pleasurable, reinforced, discriminative stimulus, reinforcing
I chose an article from Huffington Post about a new alcohol/caffeine beverage Four Loko. I actually saw this on the news earlier today so when I ran across the article, I read it to learn more. Four Loko is a “sugary, high-alcohol energy drink” that has become increasingly popular but has recently caused nine college students to become hospitalized.
I have heard that alcohol/caffeine drinks are particularly dangerous because the caffeine acts as a buffer for the alcohol making individuals feel like they are not getting drunk resulting in them drinking too much alcohol. Apparently, this particular drink is especially dangerous perhaps because of this very effect.
Anyway, broken down into the ABCs of behavior, this particular incident would look like this:
A: partying
B: drinking Four Loko
C: hospitalization
In other words, in the context of partying, drinking Four Loko elicited the hospitalization of nine students. This particular sequence is positive punishment because obviously being hospitalized (something is added) is aversive and therefore will decrease the behavior (punishment). Punishment works to decrease the frequency that the behavior will be emitted and to me, the consequence of hospitalization would definitely decrease drinking Four Loko but for some people, hospitalization is not salient enough (who knows why?!).
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2010/10/25/four-loko-sickened-centra_n_773597.html
Terms used: positive punishment, aversive, elicited, emitted, salient
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/kerry-trueman/lets-ask-marion-nestle-is_b_773656.html
The article I chose is about which method is better to leading to healthy eating for kids. The reason I picked because of healthy food. I have a lot of interested in health especially about food. When I eat something, I always consider the balance of food and how much nutrition contains food that I ate. The stealth strategies mean school employers and researchers use it to get kids to eat healthy food. They hide some healthy food like vegetables into a line of cafeteria. They think this strategies effect a change in children’s eating habits. However, the author maintains this way is not good to children. It cannot be a reinforcer to children. I agree the author’s opinion that is not honest way.
I would like to talk about behavior modification in this story is Pavlov’s theory; Stimulus and Response. Suppose the stealth strategy applied to children. In the context of cafeteria, if healthy food exposed to them, it can be a stimulus. And they elicit the not eating behavior that can be a response. However, if some healthy foods put by stealth from their sight, they will eat. Foods cannot be a stimulus to them it is not show naturally. Therefore, they will not elicit avoiding behavior anymore.
A: In the context of cafeteria
B: They see healthy foods
C: They will not eat
(Terms; reinforcer, stimulus, response, elicit)
http://www.npr.org/blogs/health/2010/10/25/130808129/rasinets-megapops-recalled-just-before-halloween
This article i found extremely important, not only for my self but for everyone! This article talks about the most recent recalled candy during this halloween season. There are some deffinite behaviors and consequences that would come out of these recalled candies. for example;
A: get a meta pop (one recalled for metal shards)
B: eat it unknowingly
C: have major health problems
Or
A: get a meta pop trick or treating
B: realize what info you have been given and not eat candy
C: save yourself money and pain
The warnings emits a do not drink behavior. if you decide to follow this and emit the wrong behavior then you will have worse consequences. The Discrimnitive stimulus will be the factor in wether you will be rewarded or punished in the behavior of eating unsafe candy. This is something super important that i think everyone should be aware of, especially around trick or treat season
terms: consequence, emit, elicit, discriminitive stimulus, reward, punishment
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2010/10/26/tariq-aziz-saddam-aide-se_n_773890.html
I choose a rather intense article about the sentencing of a member of Saddam Hussein's regime Tariq Aziz. He was recently sentenced to a hanging in a trial over crimes he commited previously. This hanging is a very harsh example of a positive punishment. If this were broken down into the ABC's it would look something like this: A=commited crimes; B=went to trial; C=sentenced to hanging.
There are many times when peoples behaviors go to far and have to end up in court to decide on the consequence. The hanging verdict is an example of an aversive punishment that will most definitely cause an extinction of the behavior being emitted if it is carried out.
Terms: Positive Punishment, ABC's, consequence,aversive, extinction, emitted.
A=part of Saddam's regime
B=emitted illegal acts of torture and murder
C=found guilty and sentenced to hangning in a trial
I chose this piece because I tend to be extremely tired during the middle of day; but not after the days that I exercise. I have always known that exercising makes you sleep better, but I believe that college students should follow this better. Maybe it’s because of the freshman 15, (or sometimes 30), or that sometimes students fall asleep in class. The article claims that exercise overrides drugs to help sleep and that exercise helps you fall asleep quicker and elicits a fast plunge into delta sleep, which is deep sleep. This can shown in the ABC’s:
A: In the context of insomnia
B: Exercise
C: Sleep more
This is positive reinforcement because we are adding sleep and wanting to sleep more, therefore increasing the likelihood of a desired behavior. The sleep would be a reward from exercising because it takes effort to get up and exercise, rather than lying on your couch.
URL: http://www.huffingtonpost.com/dr-michael-j-breus/the-heart-of-the-sleep-ma_b_750928.html
Terms used: Elicit, positive reinforcement, reward
http://www.npr.org/templates/transcript/transcript.php?storyId=122148570
The story I chose is called Deciphering The Psychology of Pricing The reason I chose this particular article is because I was curious as to why people are so obssesed with sales. I work at a retail store and people really do go nuts when we have sales when they only save an amount of like 20 cents. The article talked about how prices always end in nine so people feel like they are getting a discount and it increases sales by 20 percent. People really don't know what stuff is really woth anymore so they get into a situation termed anchoring, where people associate an items worth by the first price they hear. I expected to just see basic information maybe about buying trends ets.. Actually they went into to detail about specific tatctics companies, cars salesmen, realtors and about anybody looking to make a profit use. Who knew that resturant menus are set up using anchoring, avoidance of dollar signs , columns and placing the most expensive items in the upper right hand corner.
The way this all ties into behavior modification is how retailers are able to elicit a target behavior and make customers emit a buying behavior based simply on pricing and illusion of getting a deal. It could also be looked at in correlation to the value of reinforcements and the generalizability. The article explains that everyones maximum paying price veries thats why they make different seats on an airplane and change the cost of books on amazon overtime. The more people are told how much something is worth , the more they are willing to believe it is worth and pay more for it. Just think about jewelry , people often associate price with quality so jewelers ofter double the price and then mark it half off and see a large increase in their sales.
Terms used: reinforcement, elicit, emit, target behavior, generaliability
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-us-canada-11624156
The article I read was titled “US Woman Accused of Killing Four Babies in Pennsylvania.” This title itself was what attracted me to the article. Michele Kalina’s husband and daughter opened a closet, against her instructions, and found a set of bones. They called the police who came and said that they were not human bones and to throw them away, so they did. Later after finding more remains in other places, they called the police again and Kalina fled and was later arrested. It is believed that these babies were mostly her boyfriends, and she told both her husband and her boyfriend that she had ovarian cysts which caused her change in appearance.
There are many different behaviors and consequences in this situation. The primary behavior would be the behavior of killing the babies.
A= In the context of having a baby by another man
B= Suffocating them
C= Baby dies
After their death their remains are hidden, to later be found by father and daughter and initiate the investigation and arrest.
A= In the Context of finding remains in their flat
B= Call the police
C= Police come, investigation follows
As a result of finding these remains , her punishment begins
A= Charged with homicide and a number of other charges
B= Taken to trial
C= Probable jail time
Because in this situation they are taking away her privilege to live a free life by putting her in jail, this is a negative punishment. The hope is that she will be rehabilitated by the prison system to live a good life.
A= In the context of being convicted and sentenced to jail time
B= Time in prison
C= Better person?
The rules and unpleasantness of prison life is supposed to be enough that this woman will be changed by the time she is out (if she get out).
Terms used :negative punishment, behavior, antecedent, punishment
Side note: Could prison be considered a method of conditioning? If the neural stimulus was the unpleasantness of prison, and then the threat or idea of prison would be the conditioned stimuli to follow the law as the conditioned response?
http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=130833495
I read an article called "Is China Looking For Mr. Right (Or Right Enough)? This article was about the people of China having the belief that people need to be married in thier late teens and early twenties. I chose this article because as I was reading it I was thinking to myself that if I was Chinese I would be nearing that deadline and I couldn't imagine being married at this point in my life.
The article talks about how the chinese people are so conditioned to think that marriage needs to happen for them immediately. People are willing to forego education and careers to get married and have a family. This is a lot like the Thorndike reading we did last week. The people of China have continued arranged marriages and marrying young because they have had positive outcomes of thier behavior. Or they have been reinforced by thier families for this target behavior therefore it is repeated again and again and it has been strengthened. The article talks about a girl who is 24 and is being punished by the public being called a "left over woman" because she chose to have a career and wants to love the man she marrys. It is a very intersting dynamic that I don't think would be highly accepted in the U.S.
Terms: Reinforcement, Target behavior, Thorndike, Punishment.
This article, “Obesity In America: How the Social Norm on Weight Has Shifted” brings about the idea that a new shift on our social view of weight has taken place. The social norm of being overweight is changing. I picked this article because I have been learning a lot about the dramatic change in obesity rates in my health psychology class. I expected to see that being overweight is more of a social norm now than being of normal weight. I found the ignorance and underestimation of people’s weights to be very shocking.
“Being overweight, even 100 pounds overweight, does not trigger public discussion, but bringing one's weight into the normal range does.”
We can see these examples by numerous celebrities on the advocating and promoting weight loss programs on TV. These commercials for weight loss can actually serve as an establishing operation because when we see the effects that weight loss has on these people, the commercial can then make the product seem more reinforcing. This target behavior in these commercials could be broken down like this.
A – In the context of dieting
B – Becoming a part of a diet program
C - Lose excess weight
This breakdown is that of negative reinforcement because the consequence is taking away something negative, the excess weight, in the hope of increasing the person’s dieting behaviors. The consequence of losing weight is made to look more reinforcing by the newly thinned celebrities on TV.
Aside from this, I want to talk about the major impact of the context of situations. This article talks a lot about the social norms. Our text has discussed how culture can very heavily play into the context of behaviors. In considering the shift of being overweight as more of a social norm than being of normal weight, I was concerned with how this might affect our context. I feel that in the new context of being overweight seeming to be a social norm, it may be harder for people then to lose weight. I believe that the power of the situatoin, context, and therefore social norms have huge effects on people. Let’s take the example of a change in context. Let’s take the target behavior of singing.
A – In the context of the library
B – Singing
C – Get glared at
This breakdown would be an example of positive punishment. In order to decrease the behavior, the glaring behavior emitted is being added. In the context of the library, the norm is to not sing. Singing in this context would create problems. Let’s take a look at singing in the context of choir practice now.
A – In the context of choir practice
B – Singing
C - Get praised by the teacher
This breakdown is an example of positive reinforcement because the singing behavior is looking to be increased by the addition of a reinforcement of praise. In the context of the choir practice, singing is a socially acceptable behavior and norm. Both of the previous breakdowns had the same behavior.
I am worried that the changing of the social norm in the context of our world today on weight may reinforce people to stay overweight, which we know can lead to many health problems.
A – In the context of our society
B – becoming overweight
C – viewed positively
This breakdown is an example of positive reinforcement because the positive reinforcer will then increase the behavior to keep happening.
The context of a situation is a powerful thing and can easily change the consequences to behaviors and then change the frequency of behaviors. Although this idea may be some what of a long shot when talking about being overweight, I think it still goes to show the importance of the context for our behaviors, and how that effects certain consequences.
Terms used: target behavior, behavior, emit, positive reinforcement, reinforcer, negative reinforcement, consequences, context, frequency, establishing operations.
Oops! Forgot this! :)
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/carole-carson/the-skinny-on-globesity-f_b_770818.html
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/health-11622484
The article I chose is called “Heavy smokers at increased risk of dementia”. I picked this article because I was unaware that smoking affected the functioning of the brain. It explains how people who smoke around 2 packs of cigarettes a day are at a huge risk of developing dementia in old age due to the effects on blood pressure in the brain. The article also discusses the social aspects of dementia. Not only is it a difficult disease to try to treat and deal with as a family/victim, it also costs the country $20 billion a year. What I find most interesting about this article is how much it costs the country.
The reason I think this relates to class is because smoking is a behavior that many people emit. It’s a behavior that becomes a habit and therefore is very hard to break. In some cases, people smoke when they emit other behaviors, such as riding in the car, drinking, or even doing drugs. In those cases, the antecedent is very important. In others, smoking elicits other behaviors such as spending money to buy cigarettes. The consequences of smoking varies as well. As said in the article, developing dementia is a huge risk. Another huge risk is developing cancer.
What’s interesting, and sad, about people who smoke is that often times the negative consequence is being ignored. The only consequence that is being noticed is the positive reinforcement. People who smoke think it feels good and so good that they ignore the aversive outcomes that could happen. This isn’t always the case, however. Some people do recognize the positive punishment outcome of sicknesses they can develop and the negative punishment of the constant money they have to spend. Hopefully with the release of the findings found in the article, people will realize the aversive consequences and it will elicit them to emit a quitting behavior.
Terms: behavior, emit, antecedent, elicit, consequence, negative, positive reinforcement, aversive, positive punishment, negative punishment
http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=130837802
This article was extremely heavy. It is titled "Religious Undercurrent Ripples In Anti-Gay Bullying". This initially caught my eye because I have been hearing more and more stories of bullying and suicide related to being gay. The article discusses three things: the seemingly increasing number of teen suicides in relationship to bullying within the context of being gay, the Christian anti-gay posture, and the Christian tolerance posture. For me I find it rather sad that an 11 year old child would commit suicide because of bullying at school for being gay. The article discusses that teacher's feel that they cannot step in and stop the bullying because schools have a neutrality stance towards sexuality. Some Christian groups feel that stepping in and protecting the gay children being bullied is really the school advocating homosexuality. Other Christian groups have taken a stance against the Christian groups that are anti-gay.
A: In the context of being a gay student at school
B: Gay children are being bullied for their sexual orientation
C: Gay children are starting to commit suicide
The addition of bullying makes this positive. It is punishment because the bullying is a way to decrease an undesired behavior, which is homosexuality. Therefore the bullying is positive punishment.
A: In the context of gay children committing suicide
B: Schools are beginning to focus more on sexual orientation bullying
C: Some schools are beginning to educate children about the "normalness" of being homosexual
This is positive reinforcement. Due to the recent suicides, the schools are adopting (positive) new policies to reinforce tolerance amongst students.
Terms: antecedent, behavior, consequence, positive punishment, positive reinforcement
I have chosen an article from Yahoo Health entitled, "The Secret Fast Food Diet." Last time you told me it was OK to use an article from Yahoo, so I elected to do another one.
This article provides advice on how to eat healthy at fast food restaurants. It provides information on how to eat all the nasty fast food you want and still lose weight. It starts off by pointing out the negative consequences that are inevitable when consuming fast food regularly. I would have to say that diabetes and obesity are punishers for the targeted behavior of eating fast food a couple times a week. I will breakdown this target behavior and consequence into the ABCs to gain a better understanding of how to modify or shape this behavior and to make my blog look longer:
A: In the context of needing food to fulfill B: Eating fast food
C: Diabetes or Obesity, sometimes both
The article goes on to list different strategies to reduce the amount of calories in your fast food meal. You can order something different, not order a certain item, and say no to the value meal. Basically the author is helping you to identify discriminative stimuli. The fast food employee asking if you would like to make you order a value meal, or the sign asking you too have a super duper large soda with your burger are both examples of discriminative stimuli that you can learn to ignore, and ignoring means less calories.
Using these strategies will make the reinforcer of losing weight more pleasing because you're eating fast food! Your weight can drop without cutting out your favorite indulgence. Thus, this article has pointed out various establishing operations. Also, if you were to implement these ideas every single time you ate out at a fast food joint, you would be reinforcing yourself by losing weight over time. You'll be reinforced over an average amount of time making this schedule of reinforcement a variable interval one.
This is a good article with information that we all can put to good use. Although fast food is really good.
http://health.yahoo.net/experts/eatthis/secret-fast-food-diet
Terms Used: consequence, negative, punishers, target behavior, modify, shape, in the context of, discriminative stimulus, reinforcer, establishing operation, reinforcing, reinforced, schedule of reinforcement, variable interval
http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=129604791
Anthropology has always been a topic of great interest to me. When I stumbled across this article on the NPR website, I knew it was my god given duty to attempt and relate it to the science of behavior modification. Though it was a struggle, I ended up with a reasonable analysis.
This article is titled "Evolving Culture: Where Do We Go From Here?". Anyone who has taken an introductory physical anthropology class, such as Human Origins can understand the concept of evolution. In a system of survival of the fittest, species who adapt best to their changing environment have a higher probability of passing their genes onto the next generation. This article describes the unique position that homo sapiens are in. Unlike other animal species, our genes require little or no adaption to our environment. So how do we survive if our genes aren't adapting? The answer is simple: Culture. In particular our communication with others and our wit in general.
I see this as an example of macro-behavior modification (I may or may not have made that up!) Or, in other words behavior modification taking place on an extremely large scale in a rather unorganized, but functional fashion. The article uses a great example to describe the mechanism. For thousands of years, humans have lived in the Artic. Not because of an automatic gene adaptation, but because our decision making and the sharing of successful survival techniques. While a yak has developed a heavy coat of fur to survive in the cold, humans have invented wool coats and even glasses that help block ultraviolet light. Thorndike wasn't so interested in human evolution but his mechanism can be utilized in the study. Over the period of thousands of years, humans in the Artic experienced a 'trial and error' period. While many were not able to survive, due to a lacking of 'stamping in' the behavior, others' behaviors were modified to fit their environment.
The human race is constantly faced with critical decision making situations, many of which our vital to achieving pleasurable consequences like passing on our genes to the next generation.
Let's look at a broad example of behavior modification in human evolution. Note the target behavior is not specified.
A: Artic life
B: Adapt to cold environment
C: Procreate, pass genes on (But best of all: survive!)
Now let's zoom in a little closer, and identify a target behavior necesary for survival.
A: Artic life (Harmful ultraviolet light reflected off snow)
B: Invent, Use, and pass on snow goggles
C: Ability to hunt, and function in environment
Humans are a highly individual species in that it is our actions while on this planet, not our genes, that elicit us to survive. While both a human or a dog can be trained to emit certain behaviors in certain situations, it is humans that have the capacity to pass on these behaviors to their peers and to future generations. Perhaps this is a major reason why behavior modification is so important in human psychology.
Terms: emit, elicit, behavior, trial and error, stamped in, Thorndike, antecedent, consequence, target behavior, pleasurable
http://sports.espn.go.com/espn/page2/story?page=easterbrook/101026_tuesday_morning_quarterback&sportCat=nfl
I found an article that I particularly enjoyed by Gregg Easterbrook on Espn.com. ESPN is not exactly the poster-child for intuitive journalism and thought-provoking writing, but the recent outcry for a change in the NFL's views on its violent style of play and lackadaisical attitude on the severity of concussions has got some ESPN keyboards thumping to the beat of John Bonham's drums.
This article provides a feasible and pertinent solution to the concussions that are ravaging the football landscape as of late. An inventor has come up with a "soft" helmet that would drastically reduce the concussions in games. This same inventor has come up with safer alternatives to the current helmets before, with a few players actually utilizing them during games, but players did not think that the helmets looked cool enough to grace their heads. An uncool helmet seems a pretty petty price to pay for a brain not filled with mush. The writer's essential point of this article was calling for an NFL mandate for these safer alternatives to the current weapons that are being strapped on players heads every week.
I actually stumbled upon this article by accident while putting my homework off as long as possible, so it made me think of the topics in class as I read it. In the context of playing football, current helmets are being utilized as weapons and are eliciting concussions and possible permanent brain damage to players. If football organizations were to change to these safER (no helmet is completely safe) helmets, they would be less likely to be used as weapons and, in the event they were, would emit significantly less damage to the brain. The ABCs of both would work like this:
A1: Football game
B1: Helmet-to-Helmet hit
C1: Concussion/Brain Damage/Death?
A2: Football game
B2: Less Helmet-to-Helmet
C2: Less cranial damage and concussions
This would help with the outcry and outrage among writers as well. Their ABCs would go from looking like this:
A: Football head injuries
B: Whining, Outcry, Criticizing
C: Nothing changing
to looking like this:
A: Less football head injuries
B: Continued Whining, Outcry, Criticizing (They get paid to do this)
C: People treating them as ESPN writers again and not people that make sense.
The actions of the NFL so far in regards to the concussion topic has shown that they prefer trial and error learning as Thorndike had studied. They have done many things that have not solved the target behavior like they had wanted.
Terms: Elicit, Emit, Behavior, Consequence, Context, Thorndike, Trial and Error
http://www.npr.org/blogs/health/2010/10/26/130833815/four-loco-alcoholic-energy-drinks-blamed-for-sickening-central-washington-university-students
I chose this piece because it's very relevant to me personally and my friends, because it is about the drink 4 Lokos and we all drink those when we party. The article talks about how the drink is equivalent to a 6 pack of beer and 5 cups of coffee in one cup. So it's really easy to drink too much and the caffeine may be causing kids to think they can drink and drive. But what they're concerned with is how it's making kids sick and more end up in the hospital for alcohol poisoning.
Broken down into the ABC's:
A- college party
B- drinking 4 Lokos
C- get very sick/end up in hospital
The drink elicits a positive punishment by making kids sick or putting them in the hospital. So by that definition it should be detering usage due to aversive consequences.
Terms: ABCs, aversive, positive punishment, elicit
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2010/10/25/income_inequality_statistics_tax_code__n_773392.html
I got this article off of BBC news and there is a video clip on it as well. This is a good article especially now because its voting time, and people need to be aware of the changes that need to be made.
This piece is about decreasing middle class and the widening gap between the poor and the wealthy. In other words rich people are getting richer. The bad numbers is a result of government tax policies maintained by politicians that want to be re-elected, so they go along of what rich people want, so increased their chance of being re-elected. The unemployment rate is very high, the government spend billions of dollars to improve unemployment benefits, but the 99 weeks are up and they is still no jobs for many people.
Example #1
A: Being in a position of government,
B: favoring tax policies that benefit the rich,
C: very high chance of being re-elected.
Example #2
A: Being in a position of government,
B: raising taxes on companies that send jobs abroad,
C: benefits companies that are in America.
Money is a primary reinforcer for all of us that live in U.S. When we don’t have money we cant get our basic needs meet, like having enough money for shelter and food. Politicians that emit the policies that only seems to benefit rich, will hurt middle class a lot and it will get smaller. The desire of getting re-elected elicits that favoring the very wealthy people. For many middle class people with college degrees being unemployed is a negative punishment because its taking something pleasant like your job away from you, so this decreases the behavior of being motivated to look for a good job. This leads the individual to be positively punished because this adds a very aversive feeling, because you can not afford to have anything.
Terms Used: primary reinforcer, emit, elicit,negative punishment, positive punishment, aversive
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/science-environment-11630355
The article I chose to do is the article about more species sliding towards extinction. I chose this article because the subject seemed interesting, and also because I had never really known what percent of the world's animals were actually moving towards extinction. Within this article I expected to see a growing number of species heading towards extinction, brought on by the world just becoming an overall place due to human existence. In general I got what I expected to see, but what pleased me was seeing the conservation efforts that are actually successful in helping these animals survive. I never knew how well those did or didn't work, so i suppose that was the most interesting bit of the article for me.
The article relates more to the class than I originally expected it to, covering a lot of punishment and reinforcement within nature. Like I said earlier, conservation efforts have been very reinforcing in the survival of the animals, the California condor and black-footed ferret being two prime examples. Their efforts and behavior have helped to bring about positive change in the environment.
Another point in which our behavior has influenced the animals specifically was in the banning of commercial whaling. This would definitely be a negative punishment to a whaler, and seem quite aversive, but the result has been a swift increase in the population of humpback whales.
The highest amount of increase in animals headed towards extinction is in Southeast Asia, where loss of habitat as forests are cleared for agriculture, including biofuel crops, is fastest. The article also discusses that with the way business is developing nowadays, it will lead to a huge loss in biodiversity. Meaning that extinction will definitely be on the rise. The expanse of business is a negative punishment to these animals, eliciting behaviors they aren't accustomed to, while taking away their habitat in order to expand.
A- in the context of an animals natural habitat
B- business expand and take over land
C- animals emit behaviors they aren't used to, leading to extinction
The cycle of our expansion within business and it's effects on the animal word are quite sad, but it seems the progress has only just begun. How many species will we lose within our lifetime? It's hard to tell.
emit, behavior, elicit, negative punishment, punishment, aversive, reinforcement
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-europe-11977406
In this article Julian Assange is being held in London for sex crimes committed in Sweden and is to be extradited there shortly. Julian Assange is the founder of Wikileaks the source of the recent leaks of US government information that is both embarassing and incriminating for many countries across the globe. Many of Assanges supporters claim that he is being detained for the leaks rather than the actual crime he committed in Sweden.
A: had access to government documents
B: released them on the internet
C: incarcerated for crimes that he committed
The way the article reads is that he is being falsely accused of crimes because of the wikleaks. I am going to say that he is probably going away for both of these. If committed the crimes that he is being accused of in Sweden, he should definately go away for them. By putting himself out there and releasing those documents probably just shined a spotlight on him.
In the context of gaining access to government information, Julian Assange emitted the behavior of releasing this information on to the internet. By doing so, he elicited a head-hunting behavior of many countries, including the US that would like to emit the behavior of putting him away for the rest of his life. In short he made a choice that was aversive to far too many people, and is going to be negatively punished for his behavior.
terms: punishment, elicit, emit, aversive, antecedent, behavior, consequence
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/john-medina-phd/babies-pick-up-on-more_b_789025.html
I picked this article because the title called my eye, "Babies pick up on more than you'd think" and we are talking about ways of learning such as classical and operant conditioning. It is about the debate of if children are truly born a blank slate, or tabula rasa, or if they are pre-programed. They shared an example of a child that 42 minute old newborn stuck their tongue out at an adult as if they were copying them after the adult stuck their tongue out first. This made me question on if this was really a shaping behavior being emit or if newborn babies just stick out their tongues.
This relates to shaping behaviors which is one of the topics we were discussing in class at this time. B.F. Skinner proposed the theory of shaping which was used to actually shape the desired behavior. Usually, this is used when a behavior is wanted to be trained in a subject; however, the Bobo Doll Study showed that children will simply mirror the behavior of adults, which is what is explained in this article. As I stated, I'm not sure if the tongue-sticking-out behavior is functionally different or if it just looks the same, or serves topographical similarity. However, I also see how the researchers would think this is functionally different because of the Law of Effect, a theory proposed by Thorndike. This explains that emitted responses followed by positive outcomes are stamped in. Here, the antecedent is the hospital where the newborn was born, the behavior is the adult sticking out their tongue, and the consequence is the baby mimicking the adult and sticking its tongue out. To the adult, this is a successive response because it's what they were looking for. However, I think it is a normal response for babies to stick out their tongue even thought it is a voluntary response.
Terms: classical conditioning, operant conditioning, tabula rasa, shaping behavior, emit, functionally, topographical, antecedent, behavior, consequence