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Cut the reward and effort rises first
What extinction is
This process is called extinction, and it works only if all possible reinforcements are withheld. That is far more difficult to do in real life than in a lab.
Effort before fading
During extinction, organisms tend to look for novel techniques to obtain reinforcement. A whining child will either redouble her efforts or change tactics to regain the parent's attention before ceasing the behavior.
A combined strategy
A better extinction strategy combines methods: withhold attention after whining occurs, and reward more desirable behaviors with attention before the whining occurs.
Why does behavior spike before it fades?
Behaviorists call the jump an extinction burst: a temporary rise in the frequency or intensity of a behavior when its reward is first withheld. In laboratory studies, animals whose rewards were cut off pressed levers faster and harder before slowing down. The burst fades if the behavior keeps going unrewarded.
Why does a faded behavior sometimes return?
Ivan Pavlov observed that a conditioned salivation response, extinguished by sounding a bell repeatedly without food, came back after the dogs rested. He called it spontaneous recovery. The returning response is usually weaker than the original, and it extinguishes faster the second time.
Why is extinction harder outside the lab?
In a laboratory, the experimenter controls every reward. Outside it, other people, the surroundings, and the behavior itself may all supply reinforcement the person withholding attention never sees. A behavior with a history of occasional rewards also takes longer to fade, an effect first reported by Lloyd Humphreys in 1939.
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