Principles of Behaviorism Theory Applied to Administrative & Community Practice

Definitions
Behaviorism is a theory based on research measuring the influences on behavior (as opposed to the concepts related to the mind). Behaviorists believe that it is more fruitful to study behavior than to study history, feelings, wants, values, and beliefs. Behaviorists research the contingencies under which events result in consequences, for example, under what contingencies will a protest march result in the protesters demands being met. While behaviorism is primarily applied to individuals, such as parenting, it is very useful to analyze the rewards and punishments in management and community practice settings. A contingency is a relationship between two events, if one event occurs, then the other event follows. A positive reinforcer is something that increases the probability of the desired response, e.g., money, food, social approval, status, and achievement. A negative reinforcer is something that decreases the probability of the desired response, e.g., loss of money, disapproval, apathy, and decreased status and achievement.

Principles of Reinforcement
1. People will increase behaviors that are followed by positive consequences regardless of their beliefs about the behavior. For example, if a meeting does not start until everyone is present, then those arriving on time are punished while those arriving late are rewarded (unless additional rewards occur, such as a limited amount of food, for those arriving on time). For another example, if you give additional assignments to your hardest working employee but not to the employee that works the least, then you will tend to decrease the work the hardest working employee does unless there is some additional rewards such as praise or recognition. 2. People will decrease behaviors that are followed by negative consequences, see example #1 above. 3. Rewards that can be directly associated with a behavior are more powerful than rewards that cannot be directly associated with a behavior, e.g., community practitioners recommend striving for a quick victory or one that is fairly certain to be achieved quickly in any struggle to energize participants. 4. Rewards or punishments that immediately follow a behavior have more impact than those that follow later, e.g., a quick email reply has more impact. This principle explains one reason why it is hard to quit smoking, the reward is immediate while the punishment is occurs much later. 5. Rewards or punishments that consistently follow a behavior have more impact than those that inconsistently follow a behavior, e.g., random reinforcement yields random behavior. 6. Rewards or punishments that continually follow a behavior have more impact than those that only follow a behavior in limited situations, e.g., rewards that occur throughout the organization have more impact than those that occur only in one department. 7. Think small or focus your reinforcers on a small set of behaviors. You will have more success changing a one small problem at a time than trying to make large changes. 8. Start rewarding from where the clients behavior is at, not where you would like it to be. 9. Behavior that occurs frequently and consistently is easier to modify that sporadic behavior. 10. An intermittent variable reward structure produces behavior that is the hardest to extinguish, for example, an alcoholic parent might be very rewarding or punishing to the same behavior and produce a child who will do anything to please the parent. 11. Reinforcers effectiveness varies for different people. Some people will change behavior if they see it increase social justice. Others may be more influenced by social approval. So, know your stakeholders.

. UTA School of Social Work, Community and Administrative Practice, Dr. Schoech 17-Jan-06