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Use a favorite activity as the reward
Young children learn to sit still the same way, by being rewarded with occasional permission to run around and make noise. Running around is the preferred activity, and sitting still is the one it reinforces.
This is called the Premack principle. It is one of three alternatives to punishment, alongside extinction and the combination of prompting and shaping.
How did Premack test the principle?
In a 1959 study, David Premack gave children a choice between eating candy and playing a pinball machine. Children who preferred pinball would eat candy to earn pinball time, and children who preferred candy would play pinball to earn candy. The same activity served as the reward or the task depending on which one the child liked more.
How did rats confirm the Premack principle?
In a 1962 experiment, Premack showed that the reinforcement relation could be reversed in rats. When rats were deprived of running, access to a running wheel reinforced drinking. When they were deprived of water instead, access to water reinforced running.
How is a preferred activity measured?
Premack measured preference by how much time an animal or person chose to spend on each activity when free to pick. Any behavior that occurs more often than another could reinforce it. Before this, reinforcers had mostly been treated as objects such as food or water.
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