Punishment is a process where the consequence of undertaking behavior is immediately followed by another behavior which decreases the future occurrences of the behavior. Punishment is usually used to decrease the chances that an undesired behavior is going to occur since there will be a delivery of the consequence of some actions immediately after an undesired behavior or response has been seen. People mostly associate punishment procedures with something wrong or harmful being undertaken. The main goal of punishment is to decrease the undesired behavior. Punishment can be divided into two: positive punishment and negative punishment. Punishment can be best understood by identifying the similarities and differences between positive and negative punishment and identifying examples of the two types of punishments.
Differences Between Positive and Negative Punishment
Positive punishment can be defined as the addition of an aversive consequence after the undesired behavior has been exhibited. Negative punishment involves taking away of a reinforcing item after an undesired behavior has been identified in order to reduce the occurrence of the behavior in the future. While positive punishment deals with adding a negative consequence after a behavior, negative punishment deals with the removal of a certain desired or favorite item after a specific behavior.
Delegate your assignment to our experts and they will do the rest.
Positive punishment and negative punishment differ based on their effectiveness. The effectiveness of positive punishment usually depends on the individual and the scenario at hand. Positive punishment can be effective in situations for young children that mainly respond to the addition of a negative consequence. Negative punishment can be effective in some situations. It can be applied to teenagers where it is more effective (Crain, 2015).
Similarities
There are several similarities between positive and negative punishment. Both types of behavior deal with the same concept of the operant condition of punishment. The two types have a similar objective of decreasing any undesired behavior from happening. For both types of punishment to be effective, there are several factors that have to be put into consideration. Punishment should be applied immediately after the undesired behavior and should be applied consistently so that the undesired behavior is completely eradicated. Punishment has also been found to be ineffective since some forms of punishment such as imprisonment have been found not to achieve their desired objectives (Ferguson, 2013).
Examples of Positive Punishment
Positive punishment was used when training my dog. My dog had developed a habit where it would chew on slippers and shoes or take them away and hide them. The behavior became quite irritating as I lost some of my footwear while others became shattered. I decided to use positive punishment by scolding the dog every time I caught him gnawing my footwear or playing with them. Whenever I would scold the dog, it would stop playing with my footwear and ran away to hide. After repeating the behavior for some time, the dog quickly learned that the behavior was undesirable and it stopped gnawing my shoes and taking them away. This was an example of positive punishment as it dealt with adding an aversive outcome of scolding the dog when it exhibited an unwanted behavior of chewing and taking my shoes away.
Positive punishment was also applied to regulate my driving speed. Having acquired a new vehicle, I wanted to test the transmission and drove past the speed limit. I drove past the speed limit a couple of times even though I knew it was dangerous. However, I was stopped by a police officer one day and was given a ticket for speeding. The ticket would cost me a fine of $200. From that time henceforth, I stopped going above the speed limit and observed all the rules of the road. That was an example of a positive punishment which involved the addition of an aversive outcome of a ticket in order to stop my unwarranted behavior of going past the speed limit. The positive punishment worked as I stopped going above the speed limit.
Negative Punishment
Negative punishment was applied by my teacher and my parents when they wanted me to concentrate in class. I used to have my phone constantly with me and it would distract me with my studies and I would not concentrate in class. In one incident, I mistakenly played a video which disrupted the entire class. The teacher was quite infuriated and decided to inform the situation to my parents who decided to take the phone away from some time. This was an example of a negative punishment as it involved the removal of a favorite object, my phone, to reduce the behavior of being disrupted and not concentrating on my studies. The negative punishment worked since I concentrated more with my studies and became less disruptive.
Negative punishment was also applied to one of the employees in my recent places of work. One of the employees was lazing around and did not meet the required deadlines. This caused the entire team a significant amount of burden as they would have to compensate for his laziness by working harder. In order to remove the behavior, the team leader decided to cut the salary of the lazy individual in half with the condition that payment would be made if he showed more dedication and met some of the deadlines. This caused a significant amount of embarrassment and the employee worked harder.
In conclusion, positive and negative punishment can best be understood by identifying the similarities and differences and identifying a few examples. While positive punishment involves the addition of an undesired outcome, negative punishment involves the removal of a favorite item. The main goal of punishment is to reduce undesired behavior.
References
Ferguson, C. J. (2013). Spanking, corporal punishment and negative long-term outcomes: A meta-analytic review of longitudinal studies. Clinical psychology review , 33 (1), 196-208.
Skinner, B. F. (2014). Contingencies of reinforcement: A theoretical analysis (Vol. 3). BF Skinner Foundation.
Crain, W. (2015). Theories of Development: Concepts and Applications: Concepts and Applications . Psychology Press.
