Effect of reinforcement duration on fixed-interval responding.

Staddon (1970) tested how long the food lasted for rats working on a one-minute fixed-interval schedule. Some rats got two-second bites. Others got six or eighteen seconds of food.

The team watched two things: how long the rat waited after food before pressing again, and how fast it pressed once it started.

Longer food time made the rats wait longer after each delivery. It also slowed their running rate once they began pressing.

In plain words, bigger snacks stretch the pause and calm the run.

Pilowsky et al. (1998) and Foltin (1997) saw the same pause stretch when the reinforcer was wheel-running instead of food. The direction holds even with a different reward type.

Lowe et al. (1974) widened the question to ratio schedules and still found longer pauses with bigger rewards. The pause effect is not just for interval schedules.

Oliver et al. (2002) moved the idea to children learning communication. They found that tripling or fifteen-fold jumps in reinforcer time did not help the response stick during extinction. Longer access can waste session minutes without extra gain.

When you shape skill drills or DRL work, keep reinforcer bites short. A two-second sip of juice keeps the post-reinforcement pause tight and the next response cycle brisk. Save the big reinforcers for special celebrations, not every correct answer.