Negative Reinforcement

Description of the Process

Reinforcement is a basic process in the development and maintenance of behavior. The effect of reinforcement is to strengthen or increase the probability of a response. There are two kinds of reinforcement: positive reinforcement and negative reinforcement. Positive reinforcement strengthens a behavior because the behavior is associated with the contingent presentation of a reinforcing event. Negative reinforcement strengthens a behavior because the behavior is associated with the contingent termination of an ongoing or probable aversive event. Most people's early morning behavior of rapidly striking at the alarm clock is an example of the process of negative reinforcement at work. For most people, an alarm clock ringing at 6:00 a.m. is an aversive event. Pushing the alarm button down is a behavior that will effectively turn the alarm off. The cessation or removal of the ring is the reinforcing event. Hence, we have learned to strike at the alarm button as soon as it rings. Some of us have learned to wake up before the alarm rings to turn it off to avoid the jarring ring.

Negative reinforcement is often a key process in the development of aversive child behaviors. The following sequence of events is common within and across family exchanges:

• Event 1: Parent asks child to put away a favorite toy.
• Event 2: Child does not comply.
• Event 3: Parent repeats request.
• Event 4: Child does not comply and starts to whine.
• Event 5: Parent repeats request and starts to nag.
• Event 6: Child still does not comply and starts to tantrum.
• Event 7: Parent reacts to tantrum and says, “Settle down and stop screaming!”
• Event 8: Child stops screaming, settles down on the floor, still holding the favorite toy.
• Event 9: Parent returns to task he or she was engaged in and stops asking child to put the toy away.

In the exchange, both the parent and the child have been negatively reinforced. The child was negatively reinforced by the parent removing the request to put the toy away and the parent was negatively reinforced by the child ceasing tantrumming and screaming. The short-term outcomes of this type of exchange will be to increase the probability that the child will tantrum and to increase the probability that the parent will give in. If this type of exchange becomes a pattern of interaction between parent and child, the child learns to use tantrums and other forms of aggression as a way of controlling the environment. This pattern has been defined as a coercive interaction. The long-term outcomes associated with coercive interactions have been disrupted family patterns and children who exhibit high rates of aggression in home, school, and community.

Schools are environments characterized by a high level of expectation and demand. For some students, [Page 1396]the social expectations and academic demands of school are aversive circumstances and events. Avoiding these circumstances and escaping these demands are outcomes they desire. Often, the troubling behaviors these students exhibit have been successful in enabling them to avoid and escape aversive circumstances and demands and hence are maintained by the process of negative reinforcement. For example, if a student strongly dislikes correcting mistakes and assignments, and if swearing at a teacher has reliably resulted in being sent to the office, then it is likely the student will swear when asked to correct a math assignment. Swearing is a functional behavior that enables the student to escape the task and is negatively reinforced.

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