Instructions as discriminative stimuli.
Instructions become cues only when the reinforcement schedule backs them up.
01Research in Context
What this study did
Researchers told adults to 'respond quickly' or 'respond slowly' while they worked on three different reinforcement schedules. The team then measured how fast each person actually pressed the keys.
The study used single-case design. Each adult served as their own control.
What they found
The words alone did not rule behavior. When the schedule paid for slow responses, the 'respond slowly' cue worked best. On other schedules the same cue had little effect.
Results were mixed. The instruction only helped when the payoff matched the words.
How this fits with other research
Wright (1972) saw the same clash with children. In that study, instructions told kids whether to copy a model, but the real reinforcer decided what they did. Again, consequences beat instructions.
Cruse et al. (1966) showed that even food pellets can turn into cues. Like the words in Okouchi (1999), the pellets only guided pigeons when the schedule let them.
Fantino (1969) proved timing matters. Feedback became a strong cue only when the contingency kept changing. Okouchi (1999) echoes this: an instruction is just another stimulus; the schedule gives it power.
Why it matters
Before you give a rule, check the payoff. If you tell a client to 'wait quietly' but your token system pays for fast answers, the words will lose. Align your instructions with your reinforcement plan. When they match, you get clean stimulus control. When they clash, the contingency always wins.
Want CEUs on This Topic?
The ABA Clubhouse has 60+ free CEUs — live every Wednesday. Ethics, supervision & clinical topics.
Join Free →Audit your session: if you say 'slow down,' make sure the next reinforcer follows a long wait, not a quick response.
02At a glance
03Original abstract
Four undergraduates were exposed to a fixed‐ratio schedule under an instruction to respond slowly and to a differential‐reinforcement‐of‐low‐rate 5‐s schedule under an instruction to respond rapidly. Following this, a fixed‐interval schedule was in effect under those same two sets of instructions. For 3 of 4 subjects, response rates were higher with the instruction to respond slowly than with the instruction to respond rapidly during the fixed‐interval schedule. For the remaining subject, low‐rate responding with the instruction to respond rapidly continued during the first 17 reinforcements of the fixed‐interval schedule. Such control by instructions was not observed for other subjects exposed only to a fixed‐interval schedule, with or without instructions. The results demonstrate that the effect of instructions can be altered by contingencies and suggest that instructions can function as discriminative stimuli.
Journal of the experimental analysis of behavior, 1999 · doi:10.1901/jeab.1999.72-205