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hatred for the punishing agent or the person some trials it is given and in others it is who administers the punishment. omitted. Thus, the reinforcement may be continuous or intermittent. When a desired Number of Reinforcement and other Features response is reinforced every time it occurs we It refers to the number of trials on which an call it continuous reinforcement. In contrast, organism has been reinforced or rewarded. in intermittent schedules responses are sometimes reinforced, sometimes not. It is Amount of reinforcement means how much knownas partial reinforcement andhasbeen of reinforcing stimulus (food or water or intensity of pain causing agent) one receives found to produce greater resistance to on each trial. Quality of reinforcement refers extinction – than is found with continuous reinforcement. to the kind of reinforcer. Chickpeas or pieces of bread are of inferior quality as compared with raisins or pieces of cake as reinforcer. Delayed Reinforcement The course of operant conditioning is usually The effectiveness of reinforcement is accelerated to an extent as the number, dramatically altered by delay in the occurrence amount, and quality of reinforcement of reinforcement. It is found that delay in the increases. delivery of reinforcement leads to poorer level of performance. It can be easily shown by Schedules of Reinforcement asking children which reward they will prefer A reinforcement schedule is the arrangement for doing some chore. Smaller rewards immediately after doing the chore will be of the delivery of reinforcement during preferred rather than a big one after a long conditioning trials. Each schedule of reinforcement influences the course of gap. conditioning in its own way; and thus Key Learning Processes conditioned responses occur with differential characteristics. The organism being subjected When learning takes place, be it classical or to operant conditioning may be given operant conditioning, it involves the reinforcement in every acquisition trial or in occurrence of certain processes. These include Box 5.1 Classical and Operant Conditioning : Diff erences 1. In classical conditioning, the responses are3. In classical conditioning, the experimenter under the control of some stimulus because controls the occurrence of US, while in operant they are reflexes, automatically elicited by conditioning the occurrence of the reinforcer is the appropriate stimuli. Such stimuli are selected as US and responses elicited by under the control of the organism that is learning. them as UR. Thus Pavlovian conditioning, in Thus, for US in classical conditioning the which US elicits responses, is often called organism remains passive, while in operant respondent conditioning. conditioning the subject has to be active in order to be reinforced. In instrumental conditioning, responses 4. In the two forms of conditioning, the technical are under the control of the organism and terms used to characterise the experimental are voluntary responses or ‘operants’. Thus, proceedings are different. Moreover what is called in the two forms of conditioning different reinforcer in operant conditioning is called US in types of responses are conditioned. 2. In classical conditioning the CS and US are classical conditioning. An US has two functions. well-defined, but in operant conditioning CS In the beginning it elicits the response and also is not defined. It can be inferred but is not reinforces the response to be associated and directly known. elicited later on by the CS. Chapter 5 • Learning 83 Reprint 2026-27