Positive Punishment and Operant Conditioning

Positive punishment is a concept employed in B.F. Skinner's theory of operant conditioning. But how exactly does the positive punishment process work? The goal of any type of punishment is to decrease the behavior that it follows. Positive punishment involves presenting an unfavorable outcome or event following an undesirable behavior.

When the subject performs an unwanted action, some type of negative outcome is purposefully applied. For example, if you are training your dog to stop chewing on your favorite slippers, you may scold the animal every time you catch them gnawing on your footwear. Because the dog exhibited an unwanted behavior (chewing on your shoes), you applied an aversive outcome (giving the dog a verbal scolding).

The concept of positive punishment can be difficult to remember, especially because the name is contradictory. How can punishment be positive? The easiest way to remember this concept is to note that it involves an aversive stimulus that is added to the situation. For this reason, positive punishment is sometimes referred to as punishment by the application.

Examples

You will likely be able to notice positive punishment in your day-to-day life. For example:

• As a result of driving over the speed limit through a school zone, you get pulled over by a police officer and receive a ticket.
• As a result of your cell phone ringing in the middle of a class lecture, you are scolded by your teacher for not turning your phone off before class.
• As a result of wearing your baseball cap to class, you are reprimanded by your instructor for violating your school's dress code.

The teacher reprimanding you for breaking the dress code, the officer issuing the speeding ticket, and the teacher scolding you for not turning off are examples of aversive stimuli that are meant to decrease the behavior that they follow.

In all of the examples above, positive punishment is purposely administered by another person. However, positive punishment can also occur as a natural consequence of a behavior. Because you experienced a negative outcome as a result of your behavior, you become less likely to engage in those actions again in the future.

Spanking as Positive Punishment

While positive punishment can be effective in some situations, B.F. Skinner noted that its use must be weighed against any potential negative effects. One of the best-known examples of positive punishment is spanking, defined as striking a child across the buttocks with an open hand. According to a nationwide poll, 72% of adults reported that it was “OK to spank a child.”

Recap

While positive punishment has its uses, many experts suggested that other methods of operant conditioning are often more effective for changing behaviors in the short-term and long-term. Perhaps most importantly, many of these other methods come without the potentially negative consequences of positive punishment.