Topical Blog Week #13 (Due Thursday)

Earlier this week we learned about the topic of functional assessment of behaviors. The concept caught my attention and this gave me the perfect opportunity to learn more about the importance of functional assessment. Functional assessments fits into our chapter on self directed behaviors. In order for us to achieve our behavioral goals we need to first understand why a behavior is happening. This involves looking into the antecedents and consequences. I was especially interested in this topic because it relates to something we are applying to ourselves and if I want to reduce my own behavior of watching TV then I will need to address all aspects that go along with my TV watching habits.

A functional assessment of behavior is when the reasons for a behavior are addressed. The functional assessment comes into play when a person is looking to change an undesirable behavior. The person is most likely implementing the stages of change and in order to successfully change a behavior the consequences and antecedents of a behavior must be addressed. This is looking at what happened before and after the behavior that may be reinforcing the behavior. It moves beyond the topography of a behavior and focuses of the environmental reasons for a behavior. It helps in understanding motivations. Functional assessments assume that there is a reason for all challenging behaviors, behaviors occur in response to stimuli, behaviors are driven by the responses that follow them, and that behavior is communication. Most of the time behaviors are done to obtain something or to avoid something and making that distinction is key to understanding the underlying reasons to behavior.

A situation that serves beneficial to functional assessments is the school setting. Children elicit many different types of behaviors and in order to correct them teachers must seek to understand why the child is behaving that way. Are they acting out because they are abused in the home, don't get attention, or have ADD? There are many different possibilities for the motives and in order to best address the behavior a distinction in motive must be made. Take the example of a student acting out, the behaviors are not desirable. In order to stop the acting out it will be more beneficial to understand why the student is acting out. If it is for attention and the teacher focuses their attention on punishment of the child they just reinforced the child because they received the attention they wanted. If the child wanted attention it would be more beneficial to reduce the behavior by ignoring all acting out and giving attention to students demonstrating good behavior. In the school system functional assessments are used to decide the type of punishment to administer to a child. This way the circumstances and motives are considered and the child receives a fair punishment.

In the PBIS video provided it discusses how a teacher might have tried many different behavioral interventions and never been successful, this is because the reasons for the behavior have not yet been identified. In order to address the problem it must become an individualized task that looks at the specific circumstances of the child. Some things that need to be looked into are when, where, and why is the behavior occurring and what is reinforcing it. Under the Individuals with Disabilities Act teachers are required to do a functional behavior assessment. This requires educator to prevent and intervene with challenging behaviors by understating the underlying causes. Whether the challenging behavior is happening in the classroom or it is a behavior you are looking to change in yourself a person will not be successful until they first identify the reasons for the problem. An intervention can only work if it is addressing the correct problem.

http://cecp.air.org/fba/problembehavior/necessary.htm

http://www.behavioradvisor.com/FBA.html

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9sIYgSZiZ28

Terms: functional assessment of behaviors, self directed behavior, goals, antecedents, consequences, reinforcing, intervention, elicit, punishment, topography,

Last week we covered the topic of rule governed behaviors. The concept immediately had my interest and the assignment gave me the opportunity to expand on research and understand the concept better. In order to grasp the concept of rule governed behavior, there needs to be an understanding that the behaviors are maintained through the responsibility of controlling order where the antecedent is verbal. Rule governed behaviors can be results from established norms, morals, ethical standards, or rules people adhere to throughout history. This heightened my interest in the topic because I felt that it would make me look at the behaviors I adhere to that are established through morals, norms, or rules followed through history.

A rule governed behavior is when a behavior is maintained through social norms, morals, or verbally pasted through history. Rule governed behaviors are emitted when individuals feel obligated to elicit those behaviors solely based on obtaining something or avoiding something.

The rule governed behavior video provided, discusses how rule governed behaviors can work through several examples explaining reinforcement or punishment. An example was given about how rules can control behaviors. Rules control our behavior because of several reasons. One reason although consequences of the reinforcers are delayed, other people might provide immediate consequences, other individuals might follow. Secondly, we have a learned history of following certain behaviors. For example, we see people with a career and doing good in society, then we see people that go to prison. We usually tend to follow rules that have reinforcers and not punishers as consequence.

Rule governed behaviors means that people learn indirectly, without direct contact with the consequences. People do not need to experience the consequence directly, but by reading or learning from others. For example if someone tells you that you shouldn't take a certain class out of experience and you take the advice and don't take it, that's rule governed behaviors.

Terminology: Rule governed behaviors, antecedent, emit, elicit, consequence, reinforcers, punishers, reinforcement, punishment,

Functional Assessment

I choose to look up functional assessment because we just read about it and it’s a fairly new topic that hasn’t been talked to death yet in our class. Functional assessment as it was defined in our book is when a person who is trying to change a behavior examines the baseline they have collected about that behavior and forms a plan to work around or with antecedents that are eliciting this behavior. During my search for this topic on the web I could not find a lot of examples or writings on this specific definition, but there was a lot of material that talked about teachers performing functional assessments on children with behavioral problems in the classroom setting.

The first site I found simply defined the functional behavioral assessment as it applies to the classroom. It talked about how this was a problem-solving process for teachers when it came to students who needed specific behavior changes. Like the book definition, these teachers are also supposed to look at the antecedents that these problem target behaviors are occurring in to get at the “why” they are occurring. Once this has been figured out it talks about how the teacher can change the environment around to elicit the behavior they are hoping for.

The second site gets more specific on ways to implement a behavioral intervention and targets children with disabilities. In this article it talks about making goals and how punishment is not the main objective to foster the extinction of a behavior. It states that by altering the environment (antecedent) and using rewards (reinforcement) for the desired behavior a much better outcome (consequence) will occur. So in essence this program is not only using functional assessment to understand the problem behaviors, they are also using differential reinforcement.

The last source I got was a video clip from youtube. It is from America’s funniest home videos and I specifically want to look at the part from 15 seconds to 36 seconds. During this part a dog keeps jumping up to bite a hose nob on the side of a house. After trying many times the dog walks around and comes back to keep biting this nob. I can only assume from the dog’s behavior that he is rethinking his approach on getting this hose piece on the house when he is walking around and is therefore making an example of functional assessment in action.

Terms: functional assessment, behavior, baseline, plan, antecedents, elicit, target behaviors, behavioral intervention, goals, punishment, extinction, reinforcement, consequence, differential reinforcement

Sources:

http://cecp.air.org/fba/default.asp

http://www.greatschools.org/parenting/behavior-discipline/904-functional-assessment-a-positive-approach-to-misbehavior-at-school.gs

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zw3MrTNLH-A

The topic of Alzheimer's Disease (AD) is one that touches many people, and is effecting more and more elderly individuals. AD is increasing in frequency, and speed; not only is it sweeping through the older generations, but it is baffling Neuroscientist across the nation. Although much more is known about AD than just a few years ago, there is still no cure for it. AD takes years to progress throughout the brain, but while doing so, it begins to cripple the individual. AD starts in the hippocampus, where it starts to prevent short term memory function, until it is no longer able to create new short term memories; it is also considered a form of dementia. This decease effects one in ten people over the age of sixty-five, and it is fatal because no cure has been found. The decease is spurred by two protein abnormalities in the hippocampus, plaques and tangles slowly destroy the hippocampus. The plaques and tangles continuer to spread to different parts of the brain, creating different stations. AD effects language, logic, memory function, emotions, vision, smell, and eventually long term memory. The disease can cause hallucinations, and make standing hard. In the last stage the plaques and tangles destroy the area of the brain that controls breathing. This total process can take from eight to ten years to reach completion.

AD has been shown to have a genetic connection, and recently researchers found a gene that triples the likely hood of someone developing AD. This gene is known as the TREM2 gene, and they used a sequencing technique to find it. However, the gene that is found in AD is a variation of the TREM2 gene, known as R47H. It is rare, but potent. Having this gene does not mean you will develop AD, but it does increase your risk. This is the fist gene that neurologists have discovered that has a strong connection to AD. However, they continue to say that the best way to stop AD is through prevention. These discoveries, are important due to their potential use as identifying those at high risk for AD. People at a higher risk for getting AD are; older people, close blood relatives already or previously suffering from AD, genetic links (TREM2, R47H, APOE), females, high blood pressure for extended amounts of time, and history of head trauma. There are two different types of AD, early onset, and late onset.

AD is relative to behavior modification in many ways, it relates to topography because it changes the way memory function works. AD can also be recorded by direct, and indirect assessment. Its behavior should be recorded so that you can keep tabs on the progression of your AD. AD cannot be rewarded or punished nor should it be, but you can emit a prevention behavior. Because we don't know for sure how to detect AD before its onset (although we are getting closer) everyone should try to prevent AD. We know that certain foods, and functions can lower your risk of AD; unless you are predisposition genetically. AD can also effect a persons time frame, and it itself is on a time frame. AD can also affect ability to complete a goal, therefore slowing the likelihood of you achieving your goal. AD elicits a behavior response due to its deterioration of the brain. AD can alter a person's behavior, and make them act uncharacteristically.

Although you cannot revert AD, nor can you stop its progression, effective emotion (EE) has been shown to have a negative impact on AD. The EE behavior emitted by a caregiver can be effected by behavior modification and should be, for the extended life of the person at risk. Studies show that if an individual suffering from AD receives continuously negative EE from their caregiver their progression will speed up. To help your loved ones you should look into eliciting a happy response towards the deteriorating brain of your loved one. To do this your target behavior should be remaining happy, while giving care to someone with AD. This behavior is narrow enough that it does not extend a whole behavior class. Next you need to set up a reinforcer for producing your target behavior. Making this behavior change can produce longevity in the AD individual,

http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2012/11/121114171710.htm
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9Wv9jrk-gXc
http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmedhealth/PMH0001767/
http://geronj.oxfordjournals.org/content/48/4/P202.short

Terms: Behavior, Elicit, Topography, Direct/Indirect Assessment, Reward, Punishment, Emit, Time Frame, Goal, Target Behavior,

I choose to write about negative reinforcement because throughout the semester I have noticed how important reinforcement is in behavior modification. Last time I decided to write about positive reinforcement. This fits into what we are discussing because we recently picked a behavior we wanted to change in class. I found out it is more helpful to use reinforcement to change a behavior rather than using punishment. In class we changed everyone’s punishment to reinforcement by using differential reinforcement. Which means it is better to redefine alternative behaviors that can be reinforced, but still function to the target behavior. Reinforcement is always going to be important to understand.

I have always been interested in both reinforcement and punishment. To reach my behavioral goal in this class I am using both positive and negative reinforcement. For my positive reinforcement I am adding an additional pleasant treat. For my negative reinforcement I am taking away a workout day to allow me to regroup and be lazy. It is nice to have a great understand for both negative and positive reinforcement!

I found three sources that will help clarify the main theme, issues, and examples

In operant conditioning, negative reinforcement is removing an aversive stimulus from emitting a target behavior. Removing the aversive stimulus allows the behavior being emitted to increase the frequency of the response. The behaviors are negatively reinforced which allows you to escape from an aversive stimuli that are already present or to avoid the aversive stimuli before they happen. One of the best ways to remember negative reinforcement is think of something being “subtracted”.

Negative reinforcement can occur from natural occurring behaviors. One example could be putting on sunscreen to avoid getting sunburnt. The next example could be leaving for work early to avoid the aversive traffic. Another example could be rubbing your hands on a towel to so you don’t have wet hands. There are other negative reinforcement examples not dealing with natural occurring behaviors. One example could be a teacher removing a homework assignment due to you doing well on a test. Another example could be a mother not making you do chores for a week due to doing well on a report card.

One of the most famous examples of negative punishment is from the “Skinner Box” created by B.F. Skinner. Skinner taught rats to avoid an aversive electric shock by turning on a light just before the electric current came on. The behavior was the rats turning on the light and the consequence was the removal of the shock (negative reinforcement)

However, negative reinforcement isn’t always a pleasant thing. Sometimes behaviors being emitted are reinforced when they should not be. For example a child could be screaming (behavior) because an aversive vegetable is put on his plate. His parents finally give in and take the aversive vegetable off the plate. The child is being reinforced for a bad behavior. Reinforcing bad behaviors could cause multiple issues

Negative reinforcement can be a great manipulator if you know how to use it correctly. It is important to reinforce the behavior immediately after it happens. If you are trying to change a target behavior try to reinforce (negative or positive) instead of using punishment.

Terms: negative reinforcement, reinforcement, punishment, positive reinforcement, emit, behavior modification, behavior, differential reinforcement, Skinner Box, target behavior, reinforcer, aversive stimulus, pleasant, behavioral goal, consequences, and operant conditioning

http://psychology.about.com/od/operantconditioning/f/negative-reinforcement.htm

http://www.educateautism.com/behavioural-principles/examples-of-negative-reinforcement.html

http://www.simplypsychology.org/operant-conditioning.html

I am interested in the importance of setting goals for emitting the behavior of a healthier lifestyle. I believe that this is an important topic because many people set a goal to elicit a daily healthy way of life. This topic fits in to this chapter because of the discussion of goal setting and because now, more than ever, our country suffers from the highest obesity rates and by understanding how our behavior can be modify through goal setting.

http://www.psychologytoday.com/blog/come-your-senses/201111/success-through-your-mind-body-connection

This article is about how to start a goal and succeed through your mind-body connection. Through two different exercises it gives similar steps found in our chapter. However, this article shows the importance of being calm and and honest. I found this article to be beneficial because it gave insight as to why having a clear mind as to what, why, and how to be successful at your goal. Many people start to emit the behavior of change but have the negative consequence of failing to reach their goal because they did not completely understand what that goal was.

http://www.psychologytoday.com/blog/science-and-sensibility/201209/finally-lose-weight-and-keep-it

This article described steps in losing weight and keeping it off. It stressed the importance of a manageable goal. Some people are very unrealistic when it comes to setting a goal, especially when it comes to weight loss. Believe it or not the slower the more likely you will keep it off and most people experience a drastic weight loss in the beginning and then become disappointed when it tappers off, ultimately ending in the consequences of quitting. Also, this article used the term compound goals, meaning setting a goal for a time period and repeating it until you reach the goal. The similarity between this article and our chapter is to have a support base of similar people.

http://www.apa.org/helpcenter/willpower.aspx

This article was about willpower and how we emit the behavior of lacking self-control. Self-control, motivation, having a clear goal, and keeping track is what helps maintain our behavior, all of these, with the exception of self-control were discussed in our chapter. This article discussed studies that have been done about that of those who have higher self control, have higher success in life. I think that it would be interesting to add a section in the ABC's of willpower and how self-control is involved in achieving goals. It's almost as though you have to set a goal to achieve self-control first and then you are able to set your goal of weight loss or whatever it maybe.

Terms: emitting, behavior, goals/goal setting, elicit, consequence, support base,

The topic I chose to research more on was habits. The definition of a habit was a reccurent, often unconcious, pattern of behavior that is aquired through frequent repitition. I have a bad habit of biting my nails and I know I am not the only one who does this. I do it whenever I'm nervous or bored. I wonder how habits form, seeing how the definition says we do it unconsiously (we are unaware of emitting the target behavior). However, we get some reinforcement of doing the behavior or we wouldn't get any satisfaction out of it.
The first topic I chose to research on is the habits of children. The four most common habits children develop are nail biting, thumb sucking, hair twirling, and nose picking. Often times children suck their thumbs or twirl their hair as a comfort method. They pick their nose and bite their nails when they are bored. They also might do these things because they find pleasure from them and it could be a learned behavior that causes them to relax. Other times, if children do these things like pick their nose and get into trouble for it, they may continue to act on these behaviors as a way to seek attention.
The next topic I chose to research was something that I thought would be fun. Habits of a millionare. There were eight habits including:
1)Earn to Invest, Not to Spend
2)Have a Plan and Carry out the Plan
3)Find ways to make More Money
4)Understand and know their finances
5)Risk Taking- know if the risk is worth the consequence
6)Patience
7)Having a Team and a good one at that
8)Getting involved- making own decisions
I know money is something most people desire and this website actually made sense on way successful people are wealthy.
The last thing I chose to research is how habits develop.Due to recent research, they average a habit takes on average 66 days to develop or about two months. With that said, it could take as long as eight months for a habit to form. One habit that is often trouble for people to obtain is the target behavior of exercise. Or dieting. It's because if a person misses one day of either of these behaviors, they are more likely to skip more days and than all together go back to their normal routines.

http://kidshealth.org/parent/emotions/behavior/five_habits.html#
http://www.mmhabits.com/8-habits-of-millionaires/
http://psychcentral.com/blog/archives/2009/10/07/need-to-form-a-new-habit-66-days/

Terms used: reinforce, target behavior, emit, habit, routine, patterns of behavior, aquired, and repition.

The topic that I decided to do more research on is Edward Thorndike, which is the . I found him interesting because much of his work was based around learning. I find it interesting how people learn because that can be applied to real life situations.
Edward Thorndike is known as the father of educational psychology. Thorndike developed several learning theories. Connectionism is his most well known of the theories, which is the idea that learning is the result of connections being made between stimuli and responses. Over the course of his career Thorndike published over 500 titles and had much impact on other psychologists most notable B.F. Skinner. He was elected president of the American Psychological Association in 1912 and in 1921 he was ranked number one as an American Men of Science. Thorndike studied animals and eventually humans. For example, he studied how fast a cat could escape from the a puzzle box and measured how fast the cat could do it. Overtime that time got quicker showing that the cat was learning. He also came up with the law of effect. This is shown when people respond positively to reinforcement and negatively to punishment. Thorndike believed intelligence was measured by the number of connection made. Thorndike rejected the idea that intelligence could be measured independently of cultural background was possible.

Sources
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rCr0gFY0JlE
http://www.muskingum.edu/~psych/psycweb/history/thorndike.htm
http://www.indiana.edu/~intell/ethorndike.shtml

The section we read last week discussed rule governed behavior. Rule governed behavior is maintained by obligations where the antecedent is verbal. These behaviors can result from social norms, morals or ethical standards that have occurred throughout history. I find this topic interesting because norms and morals are not a worldwide thing, for they vary from country to country. Yes, there are some expressive norms, such as smiling, are universal, but there are few verbal norms that can be "carried" from country to country. When I traveled over the summer, it was difficult to remember what was and was not acceptable in each country I visited. What was acceptable to say/do in one country was aversive in another. When my mother and I would arrive in a new country, we would be sure to extinct any aversive behaviors and emit pleasurable behaviors in order to attend to the targeted behaviors of the country we were visiting.

The first thing I found was a YouTube video of Skinner discussing rule governed behavior. It's interesting to hear him discuss this was something he had founded so hearing his out-loook and explanation than a book's explanation that could possibly add the author's own opinion or out-look.

The second thing is an abstract of an experiment done to show "that reinforcement of the nonverbal target behavior in the absence of the relevant verbal behavior may account for the behavior changes seen in correspondence training." The participants were given a series of "variety of manipulatory responses leading to various auditory and visual consequences." The abstract was interesting to see the experiments people doing on this topic.

The third is an article from CNN about a recent action of a man. This man was found crossing-dressing in an "all women's park". Although the particular reasons are unknown, this man is breaking a few laws, verbal and written. First, the man is breaking a written law of being in the all women's park. However, he is also breaking a verbal law of cross-dressing. This article just shows how rule governed behavior, when paired with other laws, can be hazardous to one's well-being and future.

Although these three articles are all different, they're all focused around rule governed behavior. However, rule governed behaviors may not always obtain punished consequences. These behaviors can have reinforced consequences as well. Depending on the target behavior that is verbalized, these behaviors may be followed by positive reinforcement or negative punishment. However, I find it so interesting that there are so many different rule governed behaviors that many do not know about.

Terms Used: rule governed behavior, antecedent, aversive, extinct, pleasurable, targeted behaviors, punished, consequences, reinforced, positive reinforcement, negative punishment

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1tsXu74KGo0
http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC1286079/
http://www.cnn.com/2012/11/14/world/meast/uae-cross-dresser/index.html?hpt=wo_t5

I chose to learn more about the topic of rule governed behavior. I think this is an interesting concept. The definition for rule governed behavior can be explained quite simply by saying it is a behavior controlled by a verbal antecedent, but there are better ways of describing it that require a little more detail. One of the websites I visited stated that rule governed behavior is when the verbal antecedent forms a relational network that transforms the non-arbitrary environment. This definition is a little more complex but I think it is a more complete definition and seems to fit better. I think this is interesting because it is like saying that natural reinforcers are important in shaping a behavior which is completely true. Skinner introduced rule governed behavior but did not receive much recognition for the concept at first for drug recognition. But recently they are arguing that his research of rule governed behavior could have an important part in studying drug abuse. Rule governed behavior can play an important role in learning new behaviors. It allows for a person to learn a new target behavior quickly without much trial and error. An important part of rule governed behavior is making sure there is a reinforcement so the rule keeps the person on track. An example of rule governed behavior could be as simple as talking about someone cheating on an exam. It is wrong to cheat on an exam, but a person might still attempt to cheat unless they are worried about the negative consequences they would experience from the professor and college administration. Rule governed behavior is an interesting concept that I have enjoyed learning more about.

Terms: reinforcement, consequences, rule governed behavior, and target behavior.

http://contextualpsychology.org/rule_governed_behavior
http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC2748600/
http://www.equivalence.net/pdf_handouts/Rule-governed%20behavior_handouts.pdf

The topic that I chose to discuss for this blog is punishment. It largely fits into the content of this class on behavior modification because we have been talking about it from day one. I am interested in it because I think that it is fascinating that humans use punishment in the attempt to decrease aversive behaviors. This seems ridiculous considering that positive reinforcement has proven to be the most effective means of manipulating and modifying behavior.

From what we learned in class, punishment is the term in operant conditioning that is supposed to decrease the likelihood of an unwanted behavior occurring. There are two different types of punishment: positive punishment and negative punishment. Positive punishment involves adding an aversive stimulus to decrease an emitted behavior, whereas negative punishment involves removing a desirable stimulus to decrease an emitted behavior. The sources I used from the Internet also backed all of this information up.

The big question that is presented, though, asks us whether or not punishment is really effective. The answer is that punishment can be effective in some cases, but it is not effective in the majority of the situations that it is used in. It is most effective when it immediately follows the unwanted behavior and when it is consistently applied. The drawbacks of punishment, though, are pretty notable. For instance, behavior changes that result from punishment are usually temporary, punishment does not teach subjects anything about desired behaviors, and punishment can lead to unintended and undesirable consequences. Therefore, punishment should probably be carefully considered before being administered.

My sources also discussed physical punishment, stating that there is little evidence that it improves children’s behavior in the long run. Instead, physical punishment puts children at risk for negative outcomes like aggression and mental health problems. The children who are receiving physical punishment are also at greater risk for serious injury and physical abuse, which is an awful thing. Since physical punishment is proving to be ineffective, it is important that parents worldwide be educated on alternative methods to use. Parents these days are more likely to agree that using physical punishment on your children is not the right way to go about changing their behavior than they would have in the past, which is great, especially if physical punishment is causing so many problems. Norms about discipline are changing and it is a very good and necessary thing.

One specific type of physical punishment is that of corporal punishment, which is more commonly referred to as spanking. Corporal punishment is still a practice that is widely used in the United States, and it has definitely sparked many controversial discussions and debates within the child development and psychological communities. The results found in different studies on corporal punishment showed that there were strong associations between corporal punishment and negative childhood experiences. There is a boundary between punishment and abuse, and knowing where to draw the line may be a difficult task for some parents. The studies also showed that the frequency and the severity of the spanking mattered. The more often and more harshly a child was hit, the more likely they were to be aggressive or have mental health problems, which is a very scary thought. The corporal punishment, like other physical punishments, does not teach children right from wrong and does not keep children from misbehaving when their parents are not around. The studies done have indicated that corporal punishment does not do any good and may even cause harm.

All in all, the topic of punishment proved to be even more interesting than I assumed it would be. I was intrigued that my web search led me to pages on physical punishment and corporal punishment being used and its effects on children in the long run. It is awful to think that so many parents are still spanking their children without even realizing how much damage they may be doing. All I know is that I won’t be spanking my children if I ever decide to be a mother. There are too many risks involved for me to ever even think that corporal punishment, or any type of physical punishment for that matter, would be a good idea.

Sources:
http://psychology.about.com/od/operantconditioning/f/punishment.htm
http://www.opposingviews.com/i/physical-punishment-not-shown-to-improve-child-behavior
http://www.apa.org/news/press/releases/2002/06/spanking.aspx

Terms: punishment, behavior modification, aversive, behavior, positive reinforcement, manipulate, operant conditioning, positive punishment, negative punishment, stimulus, emit, physical punishment, corporal punishment

I decided to research more about the functional assessment of behavior. I found that it is very useful when someone wants to understand the function of a certain behavior or lack-there-of. I question why people do the things they do, even myself sometimes.

A functional behavior assessment (FBA) is an approach that incorporates a variety of techniques and strategies to gather and analyze an individual's behavior and circumstances to determine the purpose and/or function of the behavior in question. A FBA focuses on the biological, social, affective, and environmental factors that initiate, sustain, or end the target behavior. All behaviors serve a function, whether it is to obtain something desirable or avoid something aversive. In cases within the classroom, the FBA is designed to determine the appropriateness of placement and services, identify a positive intervention to reduce the undesirable behavior or increase the desired behavior, and develop or continue the appropriate behavior.

A source mentioned a method for conducting a FBA with a 3 step system. The first step is to describe and verify the seriousness of the problem. Does the behavior differ greatly from other individuals? Does the behavior affect the individual's abilities? Will punishment be placed if the behavior persists? These are some questions that can be asked to obtain the information necessary to understand the seriousness of the behavior or lack-there-of. The second step is to refine the definition of the problem behavior. When does or doesn't the behavior occur? What are the conditions when the behavior occurs or not? Who is present when the behavior occurs or not? These are questions that will help someone, down-the-road, come up with a hypothesis or educated guess to the reasons why the individual displays the problem behavior. The third step is to collection information on possible functions of the problem behavior. This is where the use of either a direct or indirect assessment takes place. With the use of recordings and observations and/or interviews or questionnaires, the reason for the behavior will become clearer. However, before any of this assessment can be conducted, the undesirable behavior that is occurring or not occurring needs to be determined and defined in a concrete manner. The behavior must be completely understood by all persons witnessing it.

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Terms: Behavior, Desirable, Undesirable, Aversive, Intervention, Functional Assessment, Hypothesis, Functions, Observation, and Direct & Indirect Assessment

Sources:
1.) http://cecp.air.org/fba/problembehavior2/method2.htm#Refine
2.) http://www.behavioradvisor.com/FBA.html
3.) http://www.ped.state.nm.us/RtI/behavior/4.fba.11.28.pdf

I like topics that I can personally relate to because that results in me not just doing an assignment but also investigating a question of my own I might have. With graduation getting closer and closer, I wanted to look into behaviors of interviewing. I thought I had already knew a lot of information about job interviews like; being presentable, being prepared, and having a good handshake. But I wanted to look at the behavioral side of an interview.

Interviewers have a way at looking at self-directed behavior by doing a behavioral interview. These are the interviews that ask the potential worker about their behavior in their past work environment. Questions that ask about what the worker has done in the past to solve issues and their method in which they did so allows the interviewer to get a peek at how the interviewee conducts themselves in different antecedents. This method of direct assessment is able to predict behaviors that the interviewee will likely show 55% of the time. I also know that many law enforcement agencies like the FBI and some police departments also use indirect assessment to learn about an applicant for a position. Employers have desired outcomes they want on the job site. If the employee shows potential for behaviors that will result in undesired consequences then the employers are less likely to want to hire them.

Something I didn’t expect to learn was why some people really lose their jobs. Employers do not have to tell you why you are being let go, but maybe so should. Apparently many youths who are fired believe that they were let go because they could not or did not properly fill the job description in a proper manor (education, experience, and physical ability). This is found to not be true for many cases, instead the top reasons that youths are let go is due to consistently late/absent, poor production of work, and poor relationship with co-workers. Clearly, the workers do not see the target behavior in the way that their employer sees it and it does not occur to them to change the target behavior. This means that their behavior was not punished or reinforced and will probably continue on another job site if the antecedent of both jobs is the same.

Terms: self-directed behavior, behavioral interview, antecedents, direct assessment, indirect assessment, behaviors, consequences, target behavior, punished, and reinforced.

Sites:
http://www.jobtrust.gr/en/index.php?Section=13&Part=43&Page=77
http://www.udel.edu/CSC/pdf/behav_interview.pdf
http://www.finaid.wwu.edu/studentjobs/students/resources/job_behaviors.php

Differential Reinforcement (DR) caught my attention along with its many factors when discussed in class. When I first perceived the concept of DR, it took me a while to comprehending it with its factor. I still have difficulty comprehending it but I decided to do more research on it to get a better understanding of it. My main focus will be on Differential Reinforcement of Incompatible Behavior (DRI) but DR will be discussed as well since it has the same root, or since both have similarities.

As I explored, I’ve comprehended that differential reinforcement is the reinforcement of one form of behavior and not another or the reinforcement of a response under one. So when a behavior is being emitted but is thought of as inappropriate, instead of using extinction burst, another type of reinforcement known as DRI (differential reinforcement of incompatible behavior) can be used to reduce that situation. Sometimes when we are not satiated with a behavior due to it not reinforcing us, it is better to use DRI to allow us to be positive in reducing the presence of that inappropriate behavior.

In class we elicited the concept of reducing a certain behavior in our life. The use of DRI instead of just eliminating the behavior was discussed. I chose to do a topic of me reducing the amount of time I spend on the phone and increase my study habit. I reward myself every time I study more. Let’s say if I study for about 2hrs, I go and talk on the phone for 15minutes. The more I read the less I talk but I am reinforcing myself by talking and also buying vanilla ice scream. I measure these behaviors by having a behavior diary and intervention as well.

I have a clip below of two students talking about what DRI means. This youtube video describes the topography differential reinforcement. The second link gives more examples and defines DRI. An example of DRI is that, when you are a student who emits the behavior of sucking you thumb, DRI states that you should get reinforce for keeping your thumb out of your mouth. The third link is an article that discusses the behavior modification model of incompatible behavior. This link discusses the concept that when a child is disruptive, we reinforce them for being quiet. What seems to like most about his link is the discussion of ignoring the problem behavior once the DR is initiated. All of these links have been discussed throughout the topic.

Terms used:
Topography
Elicit
Satiated
Emitted
Extinction burst
Differential Reinforcement
Comprehending
Reinforcement
Differential Reinforcement of Incompatible Behavior (DRI)
Positive
Difficulty
Behavior diary
Intervention
Initiated
Similarities

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=L3zukJ7l7Js
http://www.behavioradvisor.com/DRI.html
http://ebi.missouri.edu/wp-content/uploads/2011/09/Differential-Reinforcement-of-an-Incompatible-or-Alternative-Behavior.pdf

I decided to choose rule governed behavior. I picked this subject because I think that it is very interesting and when I read this section of the chapter I really enjoyed it.

In this article I found an example of rule governed behavior. It states that if someone tells you a vending machine is broken and you don’t put your money in the vending machine that would be considered rule governed behavior. A lot of the time rule governed behavior gets confused with contingency based but with that example contingency based would be if you put money in the vending machine and lose your money.

http://positioningsystems.com/blog.php?entryID=124

I also found that Skinner being he discovered rule governed behavior states that it is controlled by rules derived from the contingencies in the form of injunctions or descriptions which specify occasions, responses, and consequences.

http://quizlet.com/5654918/lecture-x7-rule-governed-behaviour-flash-cards/

In the last article I found it talks about how rule governed behavior can be also known as goal directed or purposive. Also it says that the environment might shape behavior in a way that will result in the efficient production of reinforcers.

http://firstmonday.org/htbin/cgiwrap/bin/ojs/index.php/bsi/article/viewFile/172/2880

I am really interested in the different reinforcements and punishments with humans and animals. I did talk about reinforcement earlier and I thought I would do punishment this time. Punishment is when a person punishes an aversive behavior in order to get a pleasurable behavior.
I really have had a hard time trying to understand the different between both the punishment and reinforcement. I tend to get them mixed up.
I found a video about a mother who punished her son for getting into a fight at school. Her punishment was for him to stand out on the sidewalk with a sign saying that he would not fight again or he would have to work hard the rest of his life in order to make a little bit for pay. This is an example of negative behavior. She was trying to remove his aversive behavior by humiliation.
The next video is an example of positive punishment. It starts out with people acting out as a family and eating dinner. The boy and girl to the right were answering the text messages and using their phones. The girl on the left told the boy that he cannot leave until his meal is finished.
My last source is a website that states the difference in the positive and negative punishment. It also has examples of real life situation. At the bottom of the website has some suggestions on how to remember the difference in positive and negative punishment.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=az8qZnT46OE
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=o7GE5FquZL8
http://nspt4kids.com/parenting/the-difference-between-positive-and-negative-punishment/

Terms: Punishment, Reinforcement, aversive, pleasurable, positive, negative

Rule governed behavior
When I first read about this concept last week, I immediately started thinking about our bases of humanistic morals. I thought about religion and how rules are set in place such as one should not murder or the individual will pay the price in the afterlife. (Of course consequences are different within different religions). Another example would be when you are cooking When cake rises remove from the oven, this evokes a specific response for the individual to follow (remove cake from the oven once it has risen). This topic got my interest because I felt that it would help me understand society and myself a little better.
http://www.calstatela.edu/faculty/zlowenk/aba1999/rule-following.html
This website goes into detail of what rule governed behavior is and how Skinner coined the term.
Rule governed behavior according to Skinner is a verbal statement specifying all or part of an actual contingency of reinforcement. Although there are often problems with this formulation due to functions and subsequent stimuli that can alter the rule governed behavior. This website also brings up memory function, recognition function and response function. Memory function refers to the preservation of the effectiveness of the rule statesman to a later time. Recognition function, this is a concept in which the individual recognizes at some later time the particular event mentioned at some earlier time by the rule. When the individual sees the cake rise again at a later time he or she will remember to emit taking the cake out of the oven as he or she will recognize the rule. Response function, now after the individual recognizes a particular event as the one specified in the rul. The subject will respond to what the rule says, in this case taking the cake out of the oven.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tYcGUPU_Two
This video is very helpful in understanding what rule governed behavior is, it goes into to detail of what the rule is ( description of a three term contingency of reinforcement and command or threat) what the punishment would be if the rule is not followed. The video also goes into detail the difference between contingency-shaped behavior (behavior is controlled by the direct effects of consequences in those settings) and rule governed behavior( behavior is controlled by the statement of the rule). Why rules control our behavior, what types of rule governed behaviors are best and why.
http://contextualpsychology.org/files/RuleGovernedBehavior.swf
This website is a quick and easy visual of how rule governed behaviors work, I enjoyed this site because I am a very visual person and I thought it was an easy way to display rule governed behaviors in a less complex manner.