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Operant conditioning, also called instrumental conditioning, is a learning process where voluntary behaviors are modified by association with the addition (or removal) of reward or aversive stimuli. The frequency or duration of the behavior may increase through reinforcement or decrease through punishment or extinction .
Central to operant conditioning is the use of a Three-Term Contingency (Discriminative Stimulus, Response, Reinforcing Stimulus) to describe functional relationships in the control of behavior. Discriminative stimulus (S D) is a cue or stimulus context that sets the occasion for a response. For example, food on a plate sets the occasion for eating.
To study operant conditioning, he invented the operant conditioning chamber (aka the Skinner box), [8] and to measure rate he invented the cumulative recorder. Using these tools, he and Charles Ferster produced Skinner's most influential experimental work, outlined in their 1957 book Schedules of Reinforcement .
Another area of growing interest in the hospital setting is the use of operant-based biofeedback with those suffering from cerebral palsy [110] [111] [112] or minor spinal injuries. [113] [114] Brucker's group at the University of Miami has had some success with specific operant conditioning-based biofeedback procedures to enhance functioning.
[1] Skinner would later use an updated version of Thorndike's puzzle box, called the operant chamber, or Skinner box, which has contributed immensely to our perception and understanding of the law of effect in modern society and how it relates to operant conditioning. It has allowed a researcher to study the behavior of small organisms in a ...
An operant conditioning chamber (also known as a Skinner box) is a laboratory apparatus used to study animal behavior. The operant conditioning chamber was created by B. F. Skinner while he was a graduate student at Harvard University. The chamber can be used to study both operant conditioning and classical conditioning. [1] [2]
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To establish the function of operant behavior, one typically examines the "four-term contingency": first by identifying the motivating operations (EO or AO), then identifying the antecedent or trigger of the behavior, identifying the behavior itself as it has been operationalized, and identifying the consequence of the behavior which continues ...