Operant Conditioning/ Rewards and Punishments (Second post) - Kyra Gilligan

 Four-term contingencies are important when studying the concept of behavior and the development of an individual. Operant conditioning is based on the idea that we can increase or decrease a certain behavior by adding a consequence. This includes positive reinforcement, negative reinforcement, positive punishment, and negative punishment. Providing reinforcement to a situation can cause a behavior to increase and continue, but punishment will show that certain behaviors have consequences. Both reinforcement and punishment can have negative and positive outcomes. These contingencies can be shown a lot through parenting. For example, a more strict parent may enforce certain rules and expectations that a more laid-back parent may not. This will show either a higher or lower level of punishment and reinforcement. Positive reinforcement is when something is added to increase the likelihood of behavior, while negative reinforcement has an opposite effect and is caused when a stimulus is removed. Positive punishment is similar to positive reinforcement, but the difference is something is added to decrease the likelihood of behavior when a positive punishment is presented. Negative punishment has a similar aspect, but instead, something is removed to decrease the likelihood of a behavior. Operant Conditioning can help improve or cause more problems in an environment and the growth of an individual. I enjoyed learning about this topic because it is such a huge part of the psychology field, and I will use this in my future career. https://sproutsschools.com/operant-conditioning/