Learning: Negative Reinforcement vs. Punishment

Details the differences between positive and negative reinforcement as well as positive and negative punishment. Instructors have …

Learning: Negative Reinforcement vs. Punishment/a>

by past publishing presents psychology in the fast lane difficult topics explained negative reinforcement versus punishment many people confuse the terms negative reinforcement and Punishment thinking they mean the same thing but they don’t remember reinforcers in general strengthen voluntary responses and Punishers weaken voluntary responses so growing up while I was in school my mom could have punished me whenever I received bad grades in order to weaken whatever behavior was causing me to get bad grades or she could have reinforced my good behavior with something desirable whenever I did study or get good grades now there are two types of each approach positive and negative positive reinforcement is a process that strengthens the likelihood of a particular response by adding a stimulus after the behavior is performed negative reinforcement also strengthens the likelihood of a particular response but by removing an undesirable consequence so my mom could have told me that if I got good grades during the school year then I wouldn’t have to get a summer job and that would be my reinforcer note that in both cases the response of getting good grades is strengthened we can punish a response by also adding or removing a stimulus like I could punish the bad behavior of a child by spanking its backside or I could punish you after you speed by taking away your driver’s license both of these things would act to suppress certain bad behaviors so punishment is either adding or removing something that would stop a response from happening again and reinforcement is adding or removing something that we encourage the response to happen again

#Learning #Negative #Reinforcement #Punishment