The maintenance of behavior by the termination and onset of intense noise.

The team worked with lab animals in a sound-proof box.

They made loud noise start or stop when the animal pressed a lever.

The question: can the noise change itself keep the lever pressing going?

Both ‘noise off’ and ‘noise on’ kept the lever pressing alive.

The result showed that an everyday aversive event can act as a reinforcer.

Weisman et al. (1975) repeated the idea with blackout instead of noise.

Their pigeons kept pecking a switch because it turned the lights off.

Allen et al. (1989) stretched the rule further.

They showed that even a stimulus that signals ‘no food’ can still reinforce an observing response.

Jones et al. (2007) seem to clash.

Their high-running mice would not work for a quick chance to run.

The difference: noise offset is a sudden relief, while 90 s of running is too short for those mice.

Same principle—relief matters—but the organism and the size of the reinforcer must match.

You now know that turning something off can be just as powerful as giving something good.

Look at what your client tries to escape—noise, bright lights, chatter.

Let brief ‘off’ periods follow the target response and you may see the behavior grow without any edible or toy reinforcer.