Hi Class,
This is the assignment for last weeks online assignment. It will count towards Attendance#13.
Continue to stay with your behavioral change project. Continue to collect data. Continue to graph the data. If you are using differential reinforcement discuss what that is and why you chose it. What are you using for a reinforcer (and when do you get reinforced). Discuss how the holidays may have helped or hindered your progress with your behavioral change project. Discuss how your project is going in general.
This is due the Thursday after Thanksgiving.
Have a great holiday,
--Dr. M
This is the assignment for last weeks online assignment. It will count towards Attendance#13.
Continue to stay with your behavioral change project. Continue to collect data. Continue to graph the data. If you are using differential reinforcement discuss what that is and why you chose it. What are you using for a reinforcer (and when do you get reinforced). Discuss how the holidays may have helped or hindered your progress with your behavioral change project. Discuss how your project is going in general.
This is due the Thursday after Thanksgiving.
Have a great holiday,
--Dr. M
I chose a goal of better communication. I specifically would like to write more letters to reach this goal. I have been tracking my progress and graphing it on a chart with the days Monday through Friday. I have documented how many letters I wrote each day, of any. So far, I have graphed three charts, one for each week I have tracked my subgoals. I feel that a reinforcerfor writing letters would be a response back from friends and family. I feel the more letters I write, the more of a chance of a response, so I feel reinforced to keep in touch via the postal service. I decided to go out of town for the holiday, whioch gave me a chance to have writing time in beautiful weather and also much time in a car. Just the right amount got accomplished. In general, I feel that setting goals and tending to them is very important. I do not feel that it is a huge help to graph these instances in excel each time they happen, but I understand the process and why it is used.
I am using the differential reinforcement of incompatible behaviors. I chose to use this because I felt that if I found something reinforcing that could not be done at the same time as my behavior I want to reduce then I could have a better chance at being successful. I want to reduce the amount of TV I watch and there are so many things that can be done while watching TV I needed t choose things that would be reinforcing separate from the TV. One thing I do now is I volunteer at the House of Hope on Tuesdays and Thursdays in my free time. This is a natural reinforcer and serves to reduce the amount of time spent watching TV. I am also using a differential reinforcement of other. Here I decided that if I was able to meet my goal each week then I could treat myself to going out to dinner or shopping with friends on the weekend and spend a little bit on money for something nice. This works because it is something that I enjoy and want to work for but also because if I can go out with friends I can't watch TV at the same time so it reduces time spent watching TV as well. This is reinforced once a week at the end of the week.
The holiday break actually may have helped in my progress. Being home there is always a lot to do and people to see. If I wasn't visiting with family and friends I hadn't seen in a while I was out shopping for Christmas presents. I was busy and there was not much down time to sit and watch TV.
Overall I think I am being relatively successful in my project. I have found other more productive things to fill my time instead of watching TV and I get more out of them. On the graphs I have created I see my minutes gradually going down and that makes me feel like I am becoming successful. My drawback I would have to say would be remembering to write down my minutes as they happen. Sometimes I forget and have to recall how long I watched TV and that makes it a little harder but I think that the more I get used to recording it every time, the more likely I will be to remember every time. But Christmas season is upon us and I love Christmas movies, so we will have to see if I can keep on track with my goal.
The behavior that I am trying to adopt is counting calories and trying to stay under 1800 calories a day on week days. I was doing so well until Thanksgiving break came. I did well the week before break so I got to have the weekend off. Well once I got home it was like I completely forgot that I was trying to change a behavior and count calories. On Wednesday I realized that I hadn’t recorded anything that I had eaten for Monday or Tuesday. So I had to sit down and try to remember everything that I had eaten and I don’t think that I remembered all of it. If what I remembered was right then I did a good job without even knowing it, which is actually reassuring to me. It is reassuring because it means that I am already subconsciously eating better and lower calories things. On Thanksgiving Day I didn’t even try to count because it is nearly impossible to count the calories of the dinner because it is all homemade so I basically just took that day especially because I didn’t want to have to worry about.
In general I am doing really well with this. I am a little worried that when Christmas break comes around that I might have a problem. I think just being at my home with my parent’s causes me to have more trouble with counting because I am not supported by my mother in this endeavor. I have actually lost 8lbs since I started doing this about a month ago so I am happy. She just doesn’t think that I need to lose any weight so trying to eat healthier and low caloried food is hard when I don’t have the support of the people around me.
My goal was to increase a workout behavior, specifically cardio and weight lifting. However, my success is very limited to Monday's. I will not lie...I'm kind of lazy when it comes to working out, and my reinforcement is not really motivating me. The holidays played a dramatic effect on the reduction of my workout behavior. One, the antecedent was different; I no longer had access to the WRC there fore could not work out for free. I also found that I had very little free time while at home for the holidays. Two, once again I'm lazy so any excuse to not move is a welcome one. Although I do emit a workout behavior on Monday, before work, it is the only day I meet my exercise needs. Wednesday, and Friday I typically do some simple exercises in my room, but cardio is usually out. Because I'm not meeting my goals, I am not reinforcing myself, sort of a punisher if you will. However, I'm beginning to see the real life example of a punisher not working.
Overall I would call my success moderate, because I elicit a workout response on Mondays, and emit one on Wednesday, and Friday. However, the workout behavior is not lasting for thirty minutes, which is a contingence of my workouts. I think reducing my expectations, and finding a new reinforcer will help me.
I am continuing to collect data...
I'm not using differential reinforcement of other because I chose to start a behavior, not decrease a behavior. I am finding though that there are so behaviors and antecedents that are competing with my behavior of running. If I can reduce those competitive behaviors then I will increase my success on running a marathon.
During the holidays, I didn't do as well with running. Part of the problem was the hectic schedule, which I know won't change much so I need to find a solution for that. Also, the freezing cold is a slight problem because after the runs if I'm not careful, I can end up with a cold and cough. So, sometimes I put off the run because of the extra cold weather, or because my diet/sleep habits aren't good.
I need to change my plan because the guy that I was going to run with Monday and Wednesday is moving down South. I think I'll switch to Tuesday and Thursday with my sisters.
All in all, the project is going well. I'm learning more about the obstacles. I'm learning how to be creative in overcoming the obstacles along the way.
My behavior goal is to exercise more and my target behavior is to emit to work out every day for 45 minutes (cardio). My goal is just focusing on how long I am doing cardio because I did not want to overwhelm myself and it is manageable.
I am not using differential reinforcement of others (DRO) because I chose to increase a behavior, not decrease a behavior. I have learned that it is better to use reinforcement than using punishment. I am using two separate things as my reinforcer. My first reinforcer is allowing myself to have a lazy day and not work out at all. I find this pleasant because I enjoy having a day off to be lazy and regroup for next week. I decided to add an additional reinforcer by allowing myself to get frozen yogurt with whatever toppings I want on it. I find this very pleasant because I usually go get frozen yogurt every once in a while; so I decided to use it for reinforcement.
During the holidays I did not do horrible staying with my behavioral goal. I live in a small town so the workout center does not allow me a lot of options. There were a few days I did not work out as long due to lack of motivation. Also I decided not to work out at all on Thanksgiving Day and just focused on spending time with my family. Also I ate way too much food and thought working out would result in an aversive consequence. I am still happy with my results from over thanksgiving break. I tried my best to stick to my behavioral goal and didn’t just give up. My target behavior was still manageable and didn’t overwhelm me.
Overall my project is going well. I am still continuing to collect data and graph my results. It is easier to stay with my behavior goal because of my reinforcers. I am going to try to stick to this behavioral goal over Christmas break and will hopefully have successfully results.
Terms: behavioral goal, target behaviors, emit, DRO, behavior, reinforcement, punishment, reinforcer, pleasant, aversive, and consequences
Although I intended to use differential reinforcement to help modify my behavior, I have found that my original plan of substituting Sprite for coffee seems to be working. Instead of drinking coffee after coffee, I’ll drink a Sprite towards the end of the day. My assumptions are that I just like to be drinking something, regardless of whether or not it contains caffeine. The differential reinforcement I planned to use was to purchase a song from iTunes if I met my coffee consumption decrease goal. I thought I would try the Sprite thing first and add in the DRO later if I was struggling, but I found that I could cut out the amount of coffee I consume pretty easily.
What has surprised me the most out of this experiment is that I am not as highly addicted to coffee as I had previously thought. It is definitely true that if I don’t drink any coffee I will experience withdrawal symptoms like a severe headache and fatigue, but if I drink 2-3 cups of coffee in the morning, that is enough to last the entire day. I think that before this modification plan I thought I would get an afternoon headache or I would need the caffeine later in the day, but this has shown me that I must have just convinced myself of that. Also, I previously drank coffee as a social thing, with my friends on campus, but since I found out that I wouldn’t experience withdrawal symptoms as long as I drink coffee in the morning, I can substitute a non-caffeinated beverage like a Sprite or even water.
For the first few days, I followed my initial behavioral plan of decreasing a little each day, but then I decided to take a risk. I typically consume about 48oz of coffee each day, but this particular day, I only allowed myself to drink 16oz when I woke up in the morning. Since I survived the whole day without a headache, I realized I could alter my modification plan more drastically. I decided to drink 16-24oz of coffee in the morning, but then to substitute water or Sprite the rest of the day. It seems to be working just fine.
Surprisingly, the holidays haven’t hindered my progress in modifying my behavior. In fact, having the time off of school and work has helped me cut out more coffee than I had even anticipated. Being able to sleep in leaves me well rested, so I don’t need the extra caffeine boost to keep me awake. Also, if I am feeling fatigued, I have plenty of opportunities to take a nap or just rest and watch TV.
My goal is to exercise more by doing a twenty-minute ab workout, five days of the week. I am not using a differential reinforcement of other behaviors (DRO) because I am trying to increase the frequency of a behavior rather than decrease. After careful thinking, I decided to reinforce myself in two ways. First, I am reinforcing myself with a favorite treat (e.g. kettle corn) every time I accomplish the full twenty-minute ab workout because I have a hard time motivating myself to do any kind of exercise. Second, performing the workout will give me an inner reinforcement of feeling good and accomplished. This reinforcer will eventually be more motivating than the treat. So far, I have been following my intervention plan moderately. I still have a difficult time motivating myself. I do succeed at exercising for some amount of time at least three out of the five days, but I usually do not workout the full twenty-minutes. Over Thanksgiving break, my progress was extremely hindered. I wanted a real break from school so I was always doing something. I either wanted to spend time with my family and friends or stay in my bed to sleep. I do not think I worked out at all that week...
I am still collecting data for this project. My goal was to decrease my time spent on social networking sites. I was going to use the reinforcement of if I kept my time spent on social networking then I would splurge on the weekends but I came to find that I am on social networking less on the weekends that I am during the week which surprised me. I think I spend more time on the social networking sites during the week because I have things to do and I’m very good at procrastinating so I feel its fine to be on social networking sites more. I decided if I kept my time under 20 minutes a day I would treat myself to eating out one night on the weekend. I think this will be better for my reinforcer. During the holidays I wasn’t on the social networking sites like at all. I think spending time at home and being busy with friends and family steered me clear of being on those sites. It felt nice not always being on my computer or phone. My project is going very well I think and I have definitely been able to bring down the amount of time I have spent on social networking sites. This has been very beneficial so far and I hope it continues to be so I could use this on something different.
My differential reinforcement is me emitting the reduction of hours on phone. I chose this target behavior due to the fact that, I want to punish the hours I emit talking to reinforcing myself into getting homework done. I reinforce myself by talking 15 minutes or less after 3hrs of studying. On the other hand, if I decided not to talk on the phone, I emit walking to an ice scream store getting vanilla ice scream within that timeframe; this is also done to kind of focus on the extinction of talking on the phone practically to once or two time a week. The holiday hindered my progress with my behavioral change project in that; I emitted calling friends to say happy Thanksgiving. I had to direct people to my house and answer phones of others saying happy Thanksgiving. This being said, I did not have time to study. I did elicit opening a book but every time I touch my computer, my mom wants me to take her to pay her bills or to the bank. In general besides Thanksgiving week, I am doing well with keeping what I have said. At the beginning, one of the chapters stated that if you will not commit to changing what you want to change then why waste your time trying to change it. So, I am being Realistic and committed to emitting my target behavior by also having an alternative behavior. I am also punishing my topography of those I hang out with in order to exemplify my accomplishment. I am managing my DR by having a baseline, measurement, my Y and X axis. I am graphing it practically to know my progress thus far.
Timeframe, Emit, Target Behavior, Topography of Behavior, Exemplify, Accomplishing, Practical, Managing, Differential reinforcement, Reinforcement, Realistic, Alternative, behavior, Baseline, Interval, Measurement, X-Axis, Y-Axis, Graphing, Punishing, Reduction, Elicit, extinction, behavioral, direct, Thanksgiving, hindered and Progress.
My behavior modification project involves reducing the amount of times uttering a certain target undesirable word during work shifts on normal week.
Saturday, Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday, Friday
I tally when I use the target word and enter it into my behavior log. I noted in a previous post that if I use target word 3 times or less during a 5 day week, I would reward myself with a SKOR chocolate bar after experimental week is over Friday after work. Thus far I am reaching a reduction in the use of the target word since BASELINE week but have not reached my goal and therefor have not yet meaningfully applied upon myself the reinforcing SKOR bar. I worked a normal week over the Thanksgiving holiday and do not feel this effected my performance. I do feel, however, that the more intense the physical labor becomes during a individual work shift, the more I tend to use the undesirable word. As my work shifts get more busy during the holiday season (shipping and handling industry) I feel that in general the holidays may increase work intensity upcoming before Christmas and this will be something to keep in mind. Thanks!!! --ebs-- 11/28/12 @ 1504hrs. CentricTime
I have continued to stick with my behavioral change project, my goal being to reduce the amount of time I spend per day on social networking sites like Facebook and Twitter. I have continued to collect data and graph that data. I have definitely been making progress and it makes me pretty happy! I am using differential reinforcement in a sense because I am reinforcing a punishment procedure. Since my goal is to reduce my target behavior, that classifies it as punishing. But, instead of punishing myself, I have been reinforcing myself with a Dairy Queen blizzard every Sunday if I get through the week with being on social networks less than two hours each day. I chose this as my reinforcement because ice cream is my one true love and if I couldn’t have it on a weekly basis, I would probably not be very happy.
Being home all week last week for Thanksgiving break, I found that it was actually easier to stick to my goal. I think being at home and with friends and family really helped my progress with my behavioral change project because of the fact that I had no time or desire to be on the computer. I was also out of town for a day and I didn’t bring my computer with me at all, which obviously helped. Also, since coming back to school, I haven’t had much time to be on social networks because of the fact that finals are so close. I have had to focus all my time and attention towards getting assignments and studying done!
All in all, I’d say that my project is going very well! I have been able to stick to my goal of being on social networks less than two hours per day since I began my intervention. I am pleased to say that I think that my project is really working and is changing my behavior for the better.
My goal is to eat more servings of fruit and veggies. I have continued to collect and graph my data. I workout and and I consider myself to be a healthy eater but when collecting my base data I realized that I have trouble eating fruits and veggies when I am stressed. After reading this weeks section, I realized that I need to be more vigilant about my antecedents. I am reinforcing my increase in servings by being able to eat dessert one night. The holidays were a challenge and I failed miserably because I at all the chocolate and candy I could. Although, coming home I was able to detox and get back on track. Now I am starting to feel a lot better and I now I know why I started to increase my behavior in the first place.
My goal is to quit smoking cigarettes. I have continued to collect and get my data sorted together and have actually been having a lot of progress. My reinforcer consists of me buying myself a cd or something every 3 days that I haven't bought a pack. So far I haven't bought a pack in a week and I have awarded myself with 2 cds that I really have enjoyed listening to. I wasn't sure at first if my reinforcer would hold enough positive valence, especially after having to wait the three days but It turns out that it has. The holiday was really nice because I was able to eliminate some of my bad antecedents like stresses from work and school and focus mainly on just not doing it. Overall I don't plan on buying any more packs and the money that I am saving from doing so is actually acting as a greater reinforcer than the buying of cds and such.
I had a general goal to stop procrastinating. The specific behavioral change I wanted to make was to study for one hour per test a week before that test. I decided to graph this by percentages. So for example if I had two tests coming up and I only studied for 90 minutes when I should have studied for 120 minutes, I would graph 75% for that day. Because I decided to use this specific behavioral goal to reinforce instead of punishing myself for the behavior of procrastinating I used the differential reinforcement technique. I felt by doing this it would make my behavioral change more successful. If I studied 100% (an hour per test), that day I got to have a chocolate chip cookie for a reinforcement, and if I studied 100% every day of the week I would get a bowl of ice cream.
The holidays did not really affect my behavioral change because I had no tests the week we got back so there was no need for me to study. The only thing that might affect my behavioral change next week is the fact that I pigged out over Thanksgiving and had a lot of cookies and sweets. Therefore my reinforcement might have lost its ability to reinforce with me because I don’t want any more sweets in the near future.
I am trying to decrease the amount of chocolate I eat on a day to day basis. I have continued to collect data and have just undated it. After looking at my graph I have realized that over Thanksgiving break apparently I didn’t care because I consumed a lot. I didn’t eat much chocolate in general but overdid it on the pie in which I determined a sweet and considered it like chocolate. I had been doing well up until break and was using Sundays as reinforcement. I call it Sunday fun day and am able to eat what I want. Last week it seems every day past Thanksgiving was Sunday. I am getting back on track and adding a reinforcement of online gaming. It has helped pull me back in. After reading chapter 5.4 I also have been using differential reinforcement. Instead of having chocolate and other sweets accessible I put fruit on the table and am increasing the frequency of eating them instead.
I am trying to start my homework earlier and not procrastinate. Over thanksgiving break I continued to collect data and graph it. I have been using ice cream as my reinforcer. If i get my assignments done on time and before a reasonable hour every night of the week I will go get ice cream with my roommates. One thing that I noticed was that because I didn't have any homework assignments or projects to work on over break my graph looks like I didn't stay on track with my goal. So overall through thanksgiving break I did stay on target with my project. It has been going well so far, it hasnt always been easy but I know that doing my homework earlier and not procrastinating will only help and benefit me in the end so its a lot easier to stay on track also because Im not giving up anything that I really enjoy.
I chose to make my workouts longer so I could make time for strenth training, as well as cardio while I'm at the gym. I want to work out for at least 60 minutes and at most 90 mintues. I have been recording my data, using excel. Over thanksgiving break, I continued my workouts and graphed it, however I realized that the holidays have hindered my my progress because I ate too much, but in a way, it also made me stay on track with my workouts. My grandma died earlier this month, and that definitely hindered my progress because I didn't work out for four days in a row. I have been using sushi as my reinforcer. I often crave sushi and am only allowing myself to have it if I emit the bahvior of working out everyday during the week. My project has been going well overall and I think in order to continue it, I have to think of it as a lifestyle change, not just a behavior change.
I am using positive reinforcement for my calorie intake. If I keep to under 1700 calories during the week, I will allow myself to go up to 2000 calories for the weekend. IF I do follow this for four or more days, I will then be able to have to 2000 calories on the weekend, if not, I am going to try to do 1700 calories on the weekend. I know that I may jump off the wagon once or twice during this but need to understnad that I can just jump right back on. This worked out great for one of my thanksgivings. My first thanksgiving on Thursday worked out well in the fact that I had used a small child sized plate to eat on and it visually made it look like I had huge helpings but actually it was half the amount that everyone else had! YAY FOR ME! My second Thanksgiving we only had a choice of one size of paper plate and I was given 2000 calories to work with.
I feel that this project has been going well for me. It has helped me get health and at the same time losing weight in order to fit into a size 12 wedding dress! :)
Testing
My behavior modification project is to reduce how many times a day I bite my lip until it hurts. By writing everything down in my behavioral diary I have found that my averive lip biting behavior is elicited by stressful antecedents. The more stressful the environment the more the lip biting/picking is emitted. When I find myself biting my lip I either put a piece of candy in my mouth or put chapstick on. By doing this I no longer have a tendency to bite/pick at my lips. Not biting my lip is reinforcing within itself because my lips don't hurt or look so awful.
Over break I seemed to bite my lip an awful lot. This Thanksgiving was rather stressful for my family this year which would be why my aversive behavior occured a lot more.
Other then over break this project has been working well for me.
I'm choosing to improve my study habits by starting my studies earlier in the evening (say around 9:30-10:00). If I can keep this schedule of studying I give myself a day off on Saturday. I allow one day of lee way and to make up for it I'll study a bit longer on Sunday, because life happens. This has been working great for me, besides some circumstances that were out of my control I've been finding that I've been getting into a schedule of studying every night at about 9:30-10:00 during the week. I've been able to sleep more and I've been retaining more knowledge it seems as I'm not doing this while running on fumes. Over break I didn't have a lot of studying to do because I had all of my papers/tests before hand, so to keep the schedule I spent my studying time reviewing for one class each night. That way I helped prepare for finals and I kept myself in the habit of my schedule!
My target behavior is to study more and my differential reinforcement is low rates because I get rewarded when I study each day. The reinforcement that I am using is that when I study for at least an hour a day, minus weekends, I get to watch television. If I do not study for at least an hour, then I don’t get to watch any television for that day. Also if I do study every day, then on the weekend I can go out to eat and treat myself. I chose these things because I enjoy watching all the television shows I watch, and it takes a lot of time out of my schedule to keep up with them all. With that being said I have to get some of my studying done this way before I can spend significant periods of time watching television. If I am not able to watch it then it makes me want to make sure I do what I’m supposed to do the next day. I also like to go out to eat, and I’m trying to limit myself on how much I spend money so by doing it this way, I only eat out once a week and then I punish myself if I don’t study throughout the week. I get other rewards as well by doing this because then I am more on top of my work load and I don’t stress myself out as much because I have things done.
During the holiday break, it was definitely hard to keep up with my target behavior. I was able to study for most of the week, as I had things to do, but there were a couple of days I didn’t do it because I was running around all over the place. I think that it didn’t necessarily hinder my progress, but for me I need to be in somewhat of a routine to keep up with things, and it was hard since all that week I had no routine whatsoever. Because of that it was hard for me to remember that I needed to study, and have time to do it. Overall I think my progress is going well. I am definitely studying more and keeping up with things. I would like to move up eventually to studying more. This week especially, I have been keeping up with it because I have so much to do that I don’t really have an excuse to not do things. I want to do it, and this week I don’t really need my reinforcers to complete the behavior. I am interested to see what happens this next couple of weeks.
I chose the goal to study at least 30 minutes a day after classes. I have been recording the amount of time I study after I get done studying, in my notebook. I later add these times into my chart on excel. I have been using time on my playstation as a reinforcement for my studying. This reinforcement is working well because I love using my playstation, so it is great motivation for me to get my studying done. The Holidays have hindered my studying, because I did not study while I was back home visiting my family. It was not a big deal because I did not have anything big study for while I was home. In general, my progress is going good, because I have been doing a good job at studying at least 30 minutes a day after my classes and I take fridays and saturdays off.
I am trying to go to bed earlier, with sleeping in on Sundays as a reinforcement. Because I tend to go to bed so late and sleep in, the reinforcement is helping and a motivator to go to bed earlier during the week (aiming for going to bed around 10pm). Thanksgiving break hindered my progress in two ways: I didn't have to wake up at any certain time the next morning and could sleep in as long as I wanted. From this, the reinforcer held no status or desire. Besides break, my progress has been really well with the reinforcer working really well.
The behavior I was trying to improve with reinforcement was my management skills. I wanted to get everything done on my to-do list for the day and get it done at a reasonable hour, so hopefully before 11:00p.m. The reinforcement I used was that if I had no or only one slip up that week one day that week I would treat myself to a dinner at any eating establishment I want to go to. I chose this because I am taking 18 credits this semester and it can be difficult to get all of homework and studying done as well as having my social time. I did not use differential reinforcement because I am not trying to decrease a behavior, just increase my productivity. The holidays helped me a lot. I had less to do and I was able to relax. So, it was a little easier to keep my to-do list done during break. In the same token I could argue that since I didn’t have as much to do over break it broke up my inconsistency with being able to get my longer to-do lists done. I feel that the project or all is going very well. I am normally keeping my productivity above 75 percent like I hoped for.
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I utilize food other than fried chicken for differential reinforcement. My choice is not specific as long as it is not fried chicken. The general reason for choosing other food is that many kinds of food can satisfy the appetite, so they work well to stop the craving for certain food. The reinforcer can be any food other than fried chicken, and it is delivered when I am hungry.
The holidays interrupted the intervention because I did not know this assignment would pop up during our vacation. I did not monitor my eating habits in my vacation. However, a couple days before classes start again I began to watch my diet again. On school days the intervention is quite effective.
My target behavior is to increase the amount of time I spend working out, which will then help me meet my goal of getting in better shape. The amount of time is measured in minutes and is recorded on the day that it happened. The antecedent that occurs when I do not work is either the gym is too full and/or I wait too late in the day and I get lazy. To when the weight room at the Wellness & Recreational Center opens. I also noticed that the consequences of missing a workout generates me to have a guilty conscience and just feels as if I need to get up and do something. Overall, I am happy with the results so far. It is now just about keeping up the behavior up. Consistency is key when it comes to getting results. My workout plan is to go to Monday, Wednesday, and Friday and do some cardio/abs on the alternative days, while leaving my weekends off. If I am successful in doing so I will reward myself with a trip to the bars during the weekend as a supplementary reinforcer to the natural results that you get from working out. I enjoy the bar experience, but it is expensive so it is a treat. As a loophole and to add some give to that rewards, so that it is possible I am still going to add the stipulation that if I miss a cardio/ab day, I still get that tripe to the bar on weekend, unless it is done on two consecutive weeks on row.
I chose a goal of bettering my study habits. I would really like to study more in each subject to reach my goal. I’ve been recording my data for several weeks, its recorded Monday through Friday with each of my subjects on one axis. I’ve recorded how long I studied for each subject each day. So far, I have recorded and graphed three weeks’ worth of data. I feel that a reinforcer for meeting my goal each week could be treating myself on a Saturday to a long day of relaxation and watching my favorite shows. I went home over the holidays which totally ruined my good streak of accomplishing my goal. Not being in a school setting really didn’t help. But, on the upside I do feel this is a great behavior to emit. It’s important I look forward to modifying.
My goal was to decrease my frequency of browsing the internet for leisure. I wanted to decrease this behavior so that I could focus more on studying. In my behavioral chart and graph, I have recorded five weeks worth of data so far. And I set up the graph with Friday-Thursday on the x-axis and minutes of browsing on the y-axis. My reinforcer is every Friday after a week with less than ninety minutes spent browsing the internet total, I get a Jimmy John's sandwich. Thanksgiving really didn't mess up my goal because I watched a lot of television, volunteered, and spent time with my family. So, I really didn't have any time to browse the internet for fun. In general, I would say that it is pretty easy to avoid unneccessary internet browsing, especially now that it is close to finals week. Also, I have very good self-control, and I tend to focus on homework and studying when I use my laptop.
Holiday Effect/Antecedent Change
The holidays, namely being at my parent’s home, had a detrimental effect on the success of my intervention. I didn’t have the tools/exercise equipment available that I needed in order to accomplish the exercise quotas. The effect of the antecedent being changed greatly impacted the ability of the reinforced interventions success.
I also realized that through my intervention that I had not created a strong enough reinforcement to drive me to increase my behavior of exercising. I have since changed the reinforcer to be daily as I apparently need to be reinforced more often. My reinforcer is pinterest/facebook use for an hour a day IF I exercise for at least 35 minutes that day. I also made a longer reinforceable goal of renting movies and having a movie night if I exercise for 5 days out of the week each totaling 35 or more minutes
The differential reinforcement I decided to use was to treat myself to a Starbucks coffee on the days I stayed 300 calories lower than my original goal of 1700 calories a day. It seems to be working, as I go through my day I start to look forward to the coffee in the evening and I find myself making sure I stay on top of my calorie count. Although, since my phone has been broken I am no longer able to keep record right away and instead have to write it down and update it online via computer. This has become somewhat of an obstacle since I am un able to constantly check my calorie intake unless I am home or nearby at a computer. Sometimes I find myself forgetting to update myfitnesspal and have to catch up from previous days. As expected the Holidays have hindered my progress in keeping under my daily calorie goal but, since I was not able to go home this Thanksgiving I believe I have done a lot better than I think I would had I gone home for the holidays.
My goal is to study more often, specifically 2 hours every day. I am using going out to eat at the end of the week if I meet the weekly goal as a reinforcer. The holiday actually helped me complete my weekly goal as I found it easier to study since I had more free time during the day than during the usual school week. Overall, my project is going well. I have only missed a few hours so far and haven't missed any since break started or since it ended. I feel optimistic about future results.
My goal was to only drink pop about once every three days, not every day. My reinforcement is no headaches and knowing that I am not drinking pop. It's bad for your teeth, health, and it makes me extremely hyper, so in cutting back it will help all of these. The holidays did not hurt my target behavior because I did not have pop every single day.
My goal is to increase the amount I read (for fun) to about 10 pages a week. The differential reinforcement I am using is to increase my reading and decrease the amount of TV I watch. I am having my Mom question me about how my reading is going (almost nightly and I am really glad she is taking the time to help me). It gets really annoying but I kind of need it to be for me to want to read so that I can say that I have been reading. If I start watching TV instead then I end up having to stay up really late just to get my reading goal for that night accomplished. Then I am tired in the morning and I know that is directly connected to staying up late.
The holidays don’t have much of an effect on my reading. I am reading at night after I get home from work so there is not much else that needs my attention (friends and family). I have even had a few times when I could actually have more time to myself to read instead of having to work on homework because nothing was due the next day.
Overall my project is doing okay. With the seasons changing the air has gotten really dry. This wouldn’t be much of a problem if I hadn’t had LASIC eye surgery this summer. My eyes are more subject to dryness because of the surgery and then my vision isn’t as clear the drier my eyes become. I have eye drops but because I wasn’t prone to dry eyes before the surgery I am not used to having to carry the bottle around.