The effects of a token reinforcement procedure on bus ridership.
Handing out tokens at the moment of boarding doubled city bus use.
01Research in Context
What this study did
Researchers wanted more people to ride the city bus. They stood at the bus door and handed each boarding rider a paper token. Riders could drop the tokens in a box at a nearby store to win small prizes.
The team counted daily riders across several weeks. They turned the tokens on and off to be sure the tokens caused the change.
What they found
When tokens were given out, bus ridership doubled. When tokens stopped, ridership dropped back. The pattern repeated every time the tokens came and went.
How this fits with other research
Lab studies with pigeons show the same token idea works indoors. Matson et al. (2008) found pigeons collected fewer tokens when they had to peck more to earn each one. The city bus study shows the opposite pattern: people kept boarding even though each ride cost the same effort.
Andrade et al. (2017) showed pigeons swapped to cheaper tokens when prices rose. Bus riders did not switch routes; they simply rode more. The difference is setting. Lab animals face tight schedules. City riders face only the choice to ride or not.
Myers et al. (2022) also tested a quick cue in the real world. Pedestrians who raised a hand got more drivers to stop. Tokens at the bus door work the same way: a small cue plus a possible prize changes behavior on the spot.
Why it matters
You can boost participation without big money or long talks. Pick a simple action you want—boarding a bus, joining a group, turning in homework. Hand over a token right as the person does it. Let them trade tokens for cheap prizes later. The bus study shows the setup doubles the target act in weeks.
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02At a glance
03Original abstract
Tokens, exchangeable for a variety of back-up reinforcers, were delivered for several days to all persons boarding a clearly marked campus bus. This procedure increased ridership to 150% of baseline. The experiment was carried out to demonstrate the applicability of operant techniques to urban transportation problems. In this study, a token reinforcement procedure was introduced in an attempt to increase bus ridership while holding the costs of reinforcers to a minimum and circumventing the problems of individual satiety and preferences and of delivering cumbersome reinforcers. A methodology for establishing a token-exchange procedure in an "open-field" behavior setting, where the subject population size, geographic location, preferences, age, sex, preferred hours of mobility, etc. are unspecified, is also presented.
Journal of applied behavior analysis, 1974 · doi:10.1901/jaba.1974.7-1