Scientific Words and their explanations:

What is operant conditioning?
While classical conditioning is a form of learning that binds external stimuli to reflexive, involuntary responses, operant conditioning involves voluntary behaviors, and is maintained over time by the consequences that follow those behaviors. In one experiment, Skinner placed pigeons individually into experimental chambers (sometimes referred to as “Skinner boxes”) that were designed to deliver food rewards at systematic intervals. He found that by rewarding a bird after it displayed a desired behavior, he could motivate the bird to increase the frequency of that particular behavior.

The tools used in operant conditioning are known as positive and negative reinforcement and positive and negative punishment.

So, what’s the difference between positive reinforcement and negative punishment? Negative reinforcement? Positive punishment? HELP!
More than one introductory psychology student has been confused by the differences between positive and negative, between reinforcement and punishment. Here are the three (and a half) things you need to know:

1. Reinforcement is used to maintain or increase a desired behavior, while punishment is used to reduce or eliminate a behavior. (Skinner argued that reinforcement is more effective than punishment in modifying behavior.)

2. Positive involves introducing or adding a stimulus to the situation. Negative, then, means that a stimulus is withdrawn or removed.

3. If a stimulus is pleasing or rewarding, your psych textbooks might refer to them as “appetitive.” If the stimulus is unrewarding or unwanted, they might be referred to as “aversive.”

3a. Positive reinforcement and negative punishment involve appetitive stimuli. Positive punishment and negative reinforcement involved aversive stimuli.

Many students think of the stimuli themselves as positive or negative, and this is where things get muddled. Say it with me: positive and negative refer to the addition or removal of a stimulus, not to the stimulus itself.

Positive reinforcement might involve rewarding a child with candy in order to encourage his playing nicely with his brother. Candy is an appetitive stimulus that is used to increase or maintain the desired behavior.

If a child misbehaves, they might have their television privileges revoked. This is negative punishment, because you’ve removed an appetitive stimulus (TV) in order to eliminate an unwanted behavior.

If the child continues to misbehave, a parent might yell at him or her; this would constitute positive punishment. It involves the application of an aversive stimulus (yelling), in order to eliminate the unwanted behavior.

Finally, the frustrated parent might negotiate with their misbehaving child by offering to reduce the chores that he or she must complete that week in exchange for the desired behavior. This is a form of negative reinforcement, since an aversive stimulus (chores) is removed in the service of increasing good behavior.

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Phenotypic plasticity: The ability of one genotype to produce more than one phenotype when exposed to different environments. Phenotypic plasticity is the ability of an organism to change its phenotype in response to changes in the environment.

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The Dunning–Kruger effect is a cognitive bias in which low-ability individuals suffer from illusory superiority, mistakenly assessing their ability as much higher than it really is. Dunning and Kruger attributed this bias to a metacognitive  incapacity, on the part of those with low ability, to recognize their ineptitude and evaluate their competence accurately. Their research also suggests corollaries: high-ability individuals may underestimate their relative competence and may erroneously assume that tasks which are easy for them are also easy for others.

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