Operant Conditioning

Note: if you haven’t read yesterday’s post, you should definitely check it out. It would really help to understand classical conditioning to understand learning as a whole.

Operant Conditioning is a learning process where behavior is influenced by its consequences. Unlike Classical Conditioning, Operant Conditioning is purely based on voluntary behaviors. It explains how reinforcements and punishments shape behaviors. It was discovered by B.F. Skinner in the mid-20th century. His experiment is actually similar to Pavlov’s but there is an important difference between the two.

Commonly called Skinner’s box or  Operant Chamber, it was a special cage, with a lever that gave a food pellet when pressed. A rat was placed in the box, and after some time, it accidentally presses the lever and receives a food pellet. The rat eats it, and roams around again. The lever is pressed by accident again, and a food pellet pops up again. Over time, the rat learns that the lever gives a food pellet, and the frequency of the lever being pressed increases, with the rat intentionally pressing the lever to get the food. The food is what Skinner called a Reinforcement. 

Do you notice the difference? When you respond to a stimulus that is conditioned, that is classical. When something you do gets a response (good or bad), that is operant conditioning. This is more commonly seen in humans. A great example is parenting. When you give a dollar every week if your children do their chores, you are reinforcing the behavior; you are giving them the cue that this behavior should be repeated. At the same time, when you ground a child for coming home too late, you are punishing the child to give them the cue that this behavior should not be repeated. Fascinating, isn’t it?