Burrhus Skinner ‘s Theory of

Reinforcement & Operant

Conditioning
 Burrhus Frederic Skinner

- Born March 20, 1904 (he died in 1990 of

leukemia), in the small Pennsylvania
- His father was a lawyer, and his mother a
strong and intelligent housewife.
- Conducted research on shaping behavior
through positive and negative reinforcement
- Demonstrated operant conditioning, a
behavior modificationtechnique which he
developed in contrast with classical
conditioning
Burrhus Skinner
1904-1990
 B.F. Skinner's Theory of Operant Conditioning
B.F. Skinner proposed his theory on operant conditioning by conducting various
experiments on animals. He used a special box known as “Skinner Box” for his
experiment on rats.
As the first step to his experiment, he placed a hungry rat inside the
Skinner box. The rat was initially inactive inside the box, but gradually as it
began to adapt to the environment of the box, it began to explore around.
Eventually, the rat discovered a lever, upon pressing which; food was released
inside the box. After it filled its hunger, it started exploring the box again, and
after a while it pressed the lever for the second time as it grew hungry again.
This phenomenon continued for the third, fourth and the fifth time, and after
a while, the hungry rat immediately pressed the lever once it was placed in
the box. Then the conditioning was deemed to be complete.
B.F. Skinner’s Second Experiment
B.F. Skinner also conducted an experiment that explained negative reinforcement.
Skinner placed a rat in a chamber in the similar manner, but instead of keeping it
hungry, he subjected the chamber to an unpleasant electric current. The rat having
experienced the discomfort started to desperately move around the box and
accidentally knocked the lever. Pressing of the lever immediately seized the flow of
unpleasant current. After a few times, the rat had smartened enough to go directly to
the lever in order to prevent itself from the discomfort.

The electric current reacted as the negative reinforcement, and the consequence of
escaping the electric current made sure that the rat repeated the action again and
again. Here too, the pressing of the lever is an operant response, and the complete stop
of the electric current flow is its reward.
Video presentation
B.F Skinner: Reinforcement Theory
Reinforcement Theory Defined
Reinforcement theory proposes – changing someone's behavior by
using reinforcement, punishment, and extinction. Rewards are used
to reinforce the behavior you want and punishments are used to
prevent the behavior you do not want. Extinction is a means to stop
someone from performing a learned behavior. The technical term for
these processes is called operant conditioning.
Positive reinforcement strengthens a behavior by providing a
consequence an individual finds rewarding.
For example, if your teacher gives you 100 pesos each time you complete your
homework (i.e., a reward) you will be more likely to repeat this behavior in the
future, thus strengthening the behavior of completing your homework.
Punishment occurs when you impose a negative
consequence to reduce an undesirable behavior. While negative
reinforcement involves withholding a negative consequence to
encourage a desirable behavior, punishment is imposing a
negative consequence to discourage an unwanted behavior.

For example, getting a write-up for

being late to work is a punishment
that is imposed on late workers to
discourage workers from being late
- an undesirable behavior.
There are many problems with
using punishment, such as:
Punished behavior is not forgotten, it's
suppressed -behavior returns when
punishment is no longer present.

Causes increased aggression - shows that

aggression is a way to cope with problems.

Creates fear that can generalize to

undesirable behaviors, e.g., fear of school.

Does not necessarily guide toward desired

behavior - reinforcement tells you what to
do, punishment only tells you what not to
do.
 The final trick up operant conditioning's sleeve is

extinction, which is a means to stop someone's learned

behavior. You attempt to extinguish a behavior by withholding the
positive reinforcement that encouraged the behavior.
For example, let's say that you manage a
production facility that had a hard time
keeping up with orders for the past few
months. You used overtime pay as a positive
reinforcement to bring workers in on
weekends and to delay vacations. Now that
you have the orders under control, you stop
approving overtime. Workers no longer come
in on the weekends to work. Their learned
behavior has been extinguished.
 Schedules of Reinforcement
Behaviorists discovered that different patterns (or schedules) of
reinforcement had different effects on the speed of learning and
extinction. Ferster and Skinner (1957) devised different ways of
delivering reinforcement and found that this had effects on:

1. The Response Rate - The rate at which the rat pressed the lever
(i.e., how hard the rat worked).

2. The Extinction Rate - The rate at which lever pressing dies out
(i.e., how soon the rat gave up).
(A) Continuous Reinforcement
An animal/human is positively reinforced every time a specific behavior occurs,
e.g., every time a lever is pressed a pellet is delivered, and then food delivery is
shut off.

Response rate is SLOW

Extinction rate is FAST

(B) Fixed Ratio Reinforcement

Behavior is reinforced only after the behavior occurs a specified number of times.
e.g., one reinforcement is given after every so many correct responses, e.g., after
every 5th response. For example, a child receives a star for every five words spelled
correctly.

Response rate is FAST

Extinction rate is MEDIUM
(C) Fixed Interval Reinforcement
One reinforcement is given after a fixed time interval providing at least one
correct response has been made. An example is being paid by the hour. Another
example would be every 15 minutes (half hour, hour, etc.) a pellet is delivered
(providing at least one lever press has been made) then food delivery is shut off.

Response rate is MEDIUM

Extinction rate is MEDIUM

(D) Variable Ratio Reinforcement

Behavior is reinforced after an unpredictable number of times. For examples
gambling or fishing.

Response rate is FAST

Extinction rate is SLOW (very hard to extinguish because of unpredictability)
(E) Variable Interval Reinforcement
Providing one correct response has been made, reinforcement is
given after an unpredictable amount of time has passed, e.g., on
average every 5 minutes. An example is a self-employed person
being paid at unpredictable times.

Response rate is FAST

Extinction rate is SLOW
Behavior Modification is a set of therapies / techniques
based on operant conditioning (Skinner, 1938, 1953). The main
principle comprises changing environmental events that are related
to a person's behavior.

For example, the reinforcement of desired behaviors and ignoring

or punishing undesired ones.

This is not as simple as it sounds — always reinforcing desired

behavior, for example, is basically bribery.
 References:
 Praveen Shrestha, "Skinner’s theory on Operant Conditioning," in Psychestudy,
November 17, 2017, https://
www.psychestudy.com/behavioral/learning-memory/operant-conditioning/skin
 https://study.com/academy/lesson/reinforcement-theory-in-the-workplace-
definition-examples-quiz.html