Operant conditioning

Operant conditioning is learning in which consequences change the future likelihood of a behavior. Reinforcement increases behavior, while punishment decreases it.

Reinforcement: A consequence that increases the future frequency of a behavior. It strengthens behavior by making a response more likely to recur.
Behavior: An organism's observable or measurable action or response. Operant conditioning tracks changes in the frequency of actions.
Edward Thorndike: An American psychologist whose research on animal learning led to the law of effect. His puzzle-box experiments showed that consequences influence repeated actions.
Token economy: A system in which earned tokens can be exchanged for valued goods or privileges. Tokens serve as conditioned reinforcers for specified behaviors.
Classical conditioning: Learning in which a stimulus comes to predict another stimulus and elicit a response. It focuses on stimulus associations, whereas operant conditioning concerns consequences of behavior.
Punishment: A consequence that decreases the future frequency of a behavior. It weakens behavior, unlike reinforcement, which increases it.
Consequence: An event that follows an action or occurrence. A consequence matters in this framework when it changes later behavior.
Law of effect: Thorndike's principle that responses followed by satisfying outcomes become more likely in similar situations. It anticipated the consequence-based account of learning.
Applied behavior analysis: The systematic application of behavioral principles to socially significant behavior. It uses consequence-based methods to assess and teach behavior.
Positive punishment: A procedure in which adding a consequence decreases a behavior. It is often confused with positive reinforcement, but it reduces rather than increases behavior.

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