My cousin inherited a car from a friend and her mother insisted she sign it over to her brother before she even received the car. Despite refusing and stating there was no reason she had to just give a car away, her mother insisted more vehemently as time went on. Finally, one night when my cousin had been sick in bed for several days her mother relentlessly insisted she sign the car over and she simply couldn’t take it anymore and did so. The behaviors of interest are my cousin’s mother insisting about signing the car over and my cousin initially resisting then doing so. By signing the car over, my cousin’s mother’s behavior was positively reinforced, she was rewarded by having something she wanted given to her most likely causing this type of bullying behavior to increase in the future. My cousin’s signing the car over was negatively reinforced since her mother’s constant insistence stopped.
In the case of Jeremy, the critical behavior is his complaining, the stimulus is the other person’s attention, comments of understanding, compassion and sympathy which is added leading to an increase in his complaining. This demonstrates positive reinforcement. To employ extinction the other person would completely ignore Jeremy’s complaining providing no response at all.

Working with a child with Autism who is head banging requires stopping the behavior immediately. Head banding can lead to retinal detachment, concussion and other serious injuries. Because of this extinction should not be used. First, it is not appropriate to ignore dangerous behavior that is self-injurious as the child will likely get hurt over time until the extinction procedure takes effect. Second, when employing extinction, first you get a response burst during which the behavior worsens as the individual is trying to determine how much their behavior must escalate to get the desired response. This means that a technique would be employed knowingly, that would increase the possibility that the child will get seriously hurt and ethically this is an unacceptable option.

I have never experienced physical punishment. An example of a time I received a verbal reprimand was when at work I was reprimanded for arriving late several times in one week. I was reprimanded by my boss who told me that this behavior was unacceptable and unprofessional and could not happen again. The behavior being punished was being late to work, the stimulus, the verbal reprimand, was added, it served to decrease (eliminate) my being late to work. Presenting an aversive stimulus that decreases behavior is positive punishment. I experienced response cost when paying my rest late. This resulted in a sizable fine. This is response cost since something I’d already earned, money, was removed through the fine. The behavior being punished was paying rent late, the stimulus, money, was removed, making this contingency negative punishment. An example of time out I experienced occurred when I was in grade school. My mother used time out for bad behavior. On this occasion I was running around the living room which wasn’t allowed in our house. My friends and brother and sister were there and they were all laughing at my behavior as I tried to run faster and faster.

My mother had a timeout chair where we had to sit facing the wall in the kitchen where there wasn’t anything to look at. My friends and brother and sister were told they would need to leave me alone and not speak to me during the time out. The behavior being punished was my running around the living room, the stimulus, social praise and attention, was removed and my behavior decreased in the future. This is a type of negative punishment since the social responses of the children were taken away in an effort to decrease my behavior. Response cost and time out are not negative reinforcement because reinforcement results in an increase in behavior.