Effects of stimulus duration on observing behavior maintained by differential reinforcement magnitude.

Pigeons pecked a key to turn on colored lights. The lights told them which schedule was next.

One schedule gave four pellets. The other gave only one. The lights stayed on for 0.5 s, 2 s, or the whole 3-min component.

Birds could peck the key anytime to see the lights again. The team counted these "observing" pecks.

When the light stayed on the full 3 min and sometimes showed the four-pellet color, birds kept pecking to look.

If the light flashed for just 0.5 s, or if both colors meant the same payoff, the birds stopped checking.

Short signals killed the behavior even when bigger food was still available.

Buskist et al. (1988) saw the same crash with pigeons waiting 27 s for food when the signal blinked off fast. Together the two papers show: brief cues fail when the delay is long.

Nevin et al. (2005) added that faster blinking lights do raise response rate, but the responses still break quickly under disruption. So rate and strength are different things.

Gaucher et al. (2020) moved the idea to autistic preschoolers using a DRL schedule. Kids with lower language scores had weaker timing control, reminding us to check client skills before we play with time-based reinforcement.

Your client needs to see the SD for the whole interval, not just at the start. If the better reward only shows up sometimes, keep that cue visible until the interval ends. Next time you run a token board or timer, leave the color, picture, or light on the entire period and only flash the "big prize" signal on select cycles. You will keep observing and rule-following alive longer.