RELATIVE RATE OF RESPONSE AND RELATIVE MAGNITUDE OF REINFORCEMENT IN MULTIPLE SCHEDULES.
Richer reinforcement in one component of a multiple schedule increases responding there, but only if you switch components quickly and keep response locations separate.
01Research in Context
What this study did
SHETTLEWORTCHARNEY et al. (1965) asked a simple question. If two schedule components give different amounts of reinforcement, where will the pigeon peck?
They used a multiple schedule. One part gave short food access. The other gave long food access. They counted pecks in each part.
What they found
Birds pecked more in the rich component. Longer food access meant more responses. The pattern looked just like schedules that differ in rate instead of size.
Even when reinforcement stopped, the birds kept the same bias. Rich-component pecks died out faster, but the ratio stayed the same.
How this fits with other research
Jones et al. (1975) tightened the rules. Matching only happened when components switched every five seconds and each had its own key. Slow switches or one key wiped the effect out.
Reiss et al. (1982) warned about a trap. Short components can fake higher rates, but only if they also hold richer schedules. Reverse the schedules and the boost disappears.
Carr et al. (1985) added another twist. Sensitivity does not rise just because the component is brief. What matters is how long the bird has been in that component since the last switch.
Why it matters
When you run multiple schedules, richer reinforcement pulls behavior toward that component. But you must switch fast, give each component its own response place, and watch for duration confounds. Check these details before you call a change in response rate a true sensitivity shift.
Want CEUs on This Topic?
The ABA Clubhouse has 60+ free CEUs — live every Wednesday. Ethics, supervision & clinical topics.
Join Free →Split your teaching table into two colored zones and swap between them every few seconds, giving longer praise or tokens in the target zone.
02At a glance
03Original abstract
Pigeons were trained on a multiple schedule in which the duration of access to grain reinforcement was varied independently in the two components. The relative response rate in one component was an increasing function of the relative duration of reinforcement in that component. The similarity of this interaction to that found in multiple schedules of different reinforcement frequency is discussed. Extinction data were also similar to those obtained after training on multiple schedules of different reinforcement frequency.
Journal of the experimental analysis of behavior, 1965 · doi:10.1901/jeab.1965.8-199