Interactions between the discriminative and aversive properties of punishment.

Pigeons pecked a key for food. Sometimes the key light turned red. A red peck gave a mild electric shock. The birds kept getting food at other times, or food stopped (extinction). The team counted pecks before, during, and after each red phase.

They wanted to know: does the same small shock work differently when food still comes versus when food stops?

Shock plus food: birds slowed down, then bounced back quickly. Shock plus extinction: birds almost stopped pecking and stayed low. After shock ended, both groups burst into extra pecks, but the food group burst higher.

The shock itself became a signal: red = danger. That signal helped most when food was gone, not when food stayed.

Hake et al. (1967) later showed the same pattern in monkeys: stronger shock = more suppression, but still graded, not on-off. Their data line up with the 1962 curve.

Kruper (1968) seemed to clash: he found punishment cut behavior by the same percent no matter how rich the food schedule was. Look closer—he tested only during ongoing food, not during extinction. The 1962 food-only condition matches his result; the extinction condition is new.

Winett et al. (1972) moved the setup into avoidance schedules and saw the same post-shock burst. The burst is real across very different contingencies.

Hayes et al. (1975) took the lab lesson to a boy who hit himself. They used brief restraint right after the first arm raise. The behavior stayed gone for years. Clinical payoff: pair the punisher with the earliest warning sign, then thin it out.

Pick your pairing with care. If you punish while reinforcement still flows, expect weaker suppression and a big rebound. If you punish during extinction (or after you have faded reinforcement), you get cleaner, lasting drops. Always plan what happens right after the punisher—because the burst is coming.