Conditioning History and Maladaptive Human Operant Behavior

Two experiments are presented which examined the effects of different past experiences (histories of conditioning) upon maladaptive human behavior in an operant conditioning laboratory situation. In Exp. I, unnecessary punished responding under a fixed-interval reinforcement schedule was shown to result from a history of fixed-ratio conditioning. In Exp. II low rates of variable-interval responding which produced unnecessary reinforcement loss followed a history of conditioning under a differential reinforcement of low rate schedule.