Control of preference in children by conditioned positive reinforcement.

Alba et al. (1972) asked whether a neutral picture could become a reinforcer. They showed five children a match-to-sample game. One choice always came with a token. The token bought candy later.

The kids played many rounds. The researchers watched which picture each child picked most often.

Three of the five children started picking the picture that had been paired with tokens. The picture itself became valuable, even before the child cashed in tokens.

The other two children kept their old favorites. Pairing worked for most, but not all.

Betancourt et al. (1971) ran a near-copy of this idea in a preschool classroom. They paid tokens for the jobs kids usually hated. Quickly, those jobs became the most popular. The token-pairing effect replicated outside the lab.

Sainsbury (1971) used button pressing instead of picture matching. When a light came with tokens, kids pressed more. The conditioned-reinforcer idea held up across different tasks.

Lancioni et al. (2011) added a twist. They let children sample each choice for just a few trials before the real test. That tiny preview made kids stick with the token side even more. The 1972 finding still stands; later work just boosted it.

If you want a child to pick a new task, book, or play area, first link it with a known reinforcer. You do not need to give the reinforcer every time; the paired cue alone can pull the child in. Try brief “preview” trials like Lancioni et al. (2011) to lock in the effect.