The effect of vicarious reinforcement on attentive behavior in the classroom.
Praising one student can lift the whole group’s attention, so aim your praise at the behavior you want everyone to copy.
01Research in Context
What this study did
A teacher praised one student at a time for either paying attention or for being off-task.
The class had students with intellectual disabilities. The researchers used an ABAB design. They watched how the praised student and the nearby, non-praised students behaved.
What they found
When the teacher praised the target student for paying attention, the other kids also looked and listened more.
Oddly, when the teacher praised the target for being inattentive, the peers still paid better attention. The praise itself, not the exact behavior, seemed to cue everyone to focus.
How this fits with other research
Baron et al. (1968) saw the same spill-over with preschoolers’ speech. Reinforcing English words also lifted unreinforced Russian words. Both studies show vicarious reinforcement works across very different skills.
Catagnus et al. (2020) later boosted group attending with a bell cue instead of praise. Their stimulus-transfer tactic gives you a second tool if praise alone feels thin.
Weinsztok et al. (2023) warn that praise is usually weaker than edibles for fast skill growth. Their review does not contradict McMillan (1973); it simply reminds you to swap in stronger reinforcers when speed matters more than peer effects.
Why it matters
Your words to one student can quietly organize the whole table. Use clear, upbeat praise for attentive acts and you may get a free boost from the rest of the group. If attention is still low, pair your praise with a brief auditory cue or switch to a tangible reinforcer for the target student. Either way, stay aware that what you reinforce is also what you broadcast.
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02At a glance
03Original abstract
The effect of social reinforcement delivered to target subjects on the attentive behavior of adjacent peers was examined in a classroom setting. In a combined reversal and multiple baseline design, two pairs of mentally retarded children were sequentially exposed to three reinforcement phases. After baseline rates of attentive behavior were obtained, praise was delivered to the target subject in each subject pair for attentive behavior. After a reversal phase, praise was delivered contingently to target subjects for inattentive behavior. In a final phase, contingent praise for attentive behavior was reinstated for the target subjects. Throughout the study, nontarget subjects received no direct reinforcers. The results indicated a vicarious reinforcement effect. Reinforcing attentive behavior of target subjects increased this behavior in adjacent peers. However, reinforcing inattentive behavior of target subjects also increased the attentive behavior of adjacent peers. The effects obtained through vicarious reinforcement were considered to reflect the discriminative stimulus properties of reinforcement, which may serve as a cue for the performance of nonreinforced peers.
Journal of applied behavior analysis, 1973 · doi:10.1901/jaba.1973.6-71