Humans' choice in a self-control choice situation: sensitivity to reinforcer amount, reinforcer delay, and overall reinforcement density.
Clients pick the option that gives the richest overall minute-by-minute payoff, so plan schedules by rate, not delay.
01Research in Context
What this study did
The team asked adults to pick between two buttons. One button gave a small reward right away. The other gave a bigger reward after a wait.
They changed three things across trials: size of the reward, length of the wait, and how often rewards were given overall.
The goal was to see which factor mattered most to the person’s choice.
What they found
People looked at the whole picture. They picked the side that gave more total reward per minute.
Delay and size mattered only if they changed that overall rate. The study calls this a “molar” view of self-control.
How this fits with other research
Carmichael et al. (1999) ran a similar lab test. They also found that rate of reward, not the change-over rule, steered choice. The two papers echo each other even though one used delays and the other used special switch rules.
Lattal (1974) came first. That study showed response rates follow a neat curve tied to relative payoff. Wilkinson et al. (1998) widen the idea by showing the same curve guides big-picture choices, not just button presses.
Belisle et al. (2019) take the idea into social land. They showed that making people feel “short on money” shifts how they share dollars. The rule is the same: people track overall payoff, then act.
Heavey et al. (2000) worked with kids who had problem behavior. They saw that dense free rewards can block new requests. Both studies tweak density, one in choice, one in treatment, and both find density drives the result.
Why it matters
When you write a program, think in rates, not just “big cookie later.” Count how many reinforcers occur per minute of the whole cycle. If the lean side still gives more total payoff, the client will drift there no matter how shiny your token board looks. Check density first, then adjust delay or size.
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02At a glance
03Original abstract
Human subjects were exposed to a concurrent-chains schedule in which reinforcer amounts, delays, or both were varied in the terminal links, and consummatory responses were required to receive points that were later exchangeable for money. Two independent variable-interval 30-s schedules were in effect during the initial links, and delay periods were defined by fixed-time schedules. In Experiment 1, subjects were exposed to three different pairs of reinforcer amounts and delays, and sensitivity to reinforcer amount and delay was determined based on the generalized matching law. The relative responding (choice) of most subjects was more sensitive to reinforcer amount than to reinforcer delay. In Experiment 2, subjects chose between immediate smaller reinforcers and delayed larger reinforcers in five conditions with and without timeout periods that followed a shorter delay, in which reinforcer amounts and delays were combined to make different predictions based on local reinforcement density (i.e., points per delay) or overall reinforcement density (i.e., points per total time). In most conditions, subjects' choices were qualitatively in accord with the predictions from the overall reinforcement density calculated by the ratio of reinforcer amount and total time. Therefore, the overall reinforcement density appears to influence the preference of humans in the present self-control choice situation.
Journal of the experimental analysis of behavior, 1998 · doi:10.1901/jeab.1998.69-87