An Evaluation of the Effects of Reinforcer Magnitude on Preference and On-task Behavior

Abstract

Stimulus preference assessments (SPAs) are conducted to identify reinforcers. Among the variables that affect preference and reinforcer efficacy is magnitude of reinforcement. The purposes of the current studies were to (a) evaluate the extent to which magnitude (i.e., short vs long durations of item access) affects preferences of typically developing preschool-age children and (b) compare levels of on-task behavior when different magnitudes of reinforcement were provided. Study 1 results demonstrated that rankings for high-preferred items remained relatively stable across magnitudes. However, some items were shown to have disparate rankings across magnitudes. Study 2 results demonstrated that some participants (5/9) did not display increased levels of on-task behavior for either magnitude of reinforcement. However, some participants (4/9) showed that both magnitudes of reinforcement maintained the same level of on-task behavior when the work requirement was relatively small, but a larger magnitude maintained more on-task behavior as the work requirement was increased.