Behavioral economics of drug self-administration. II. A unit-price analysis of cigarette smoking.
Unit price predicts how much humans smoke, just like it predicts animal drug taking.
01Research in Context
What this study did
Researchers let adults smoke cigarettes in a lab. Each puff cost a set number of button presses. The price went up across sessions. The team counted how many puffs people took at each price.
They wanted to see if human smoking follows the same economic rule that works with animals: pay more, buy less.
What they found
Puffs dropped when the price rose. The curve looked just like monkey data. Equal unit prices gave equal puff counts, even when the ratio size or puff size changed.
Unit price (responses per puff) predicted the whole pattern. Magnitude and ratio size traded off perfectly.
How this fits with other research
Jason et al. (1985) showed the same price curve in monkeys working for oral drugs. The animal rule now works for humans smoking cigarettes.
Doughty et al. (2002) found bigger reinforcers hurt DRL performance in rats and pigeons. Bickel et al. (1991) show the flip side: in humans, bigger puffs count as lower unit price, so consumption rises. Same variable, opposite direction, because the schedule differs.
Locurto et al. (1980) showed high ratios can flip stimulant effects from bad to good. Bickel et al. (1991) use high ratios on purpose to raise price, proving ratio strain is a tool, not a flaw.
Why it matters
You can now treat cigarette smoking like any other operant. Raise the unit price—ask for more responses, give smaller puffs, or add delay—and smoking should fall along a predictable curve. Use this when designing self-management plans or contingency contracts with clients who smoke.
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02At a glance
03Original abstract
In behavioral economics, the ratio of response requirement to reinforcer magnitude is referred to as unit price. Previous research with nonhuman subjects has demonstrated that (a) comparable amounts of food are consumed at the same unit price even though different response requirements and reinforcer magnitudes comprise that unit price and (b) increases in unit price decrease food consumption in a positively decelerating fashion. The present study assessed the generality of these findings to the cigarette smoking of 5 human volunteers. During approximately 18 3-hr sessions, various combinations of response requirement (fixed-ratio 200, 400, and 1,600) and reinforcer magnitude (1, 2, and 4 puffs per bout) were arranged. Consumption (i.e., the number of puffs) generally was comparable at the same unit price independent of the response requirement and reinforcer magnitude comprising that unit price. In addition, increasing unit price generally decreased consumption in a positively decelerating fashion. These results extend the generality of the unit-price analysis to human cigarette smoking. Moreover, these results further support the position that reinforcer magnitude and response requirement are functionally equivalent and interact to determine consumption. The concept of unit price, by integrating and summarizing the effects of those two operations, provides a more parsimonious explanation of the results than do separate evaluations of the effects of response requirement and reinforcer magnitude.
Journal of the experimental analysis of behavior, 1991 · doi:10.1901/jeab.1991.55-145