Basic and Applied Research on Choice Responding

Abstract

Choice responding refers to the manner in which individuals allocate their time or responding among available response options. In this article, we first review basic investigations that have identified and examined variables that influence choice responding, such as response effort and reinforcement rate, immediacy, and quality. We then describe recent bridge and applied studies that illustrate how the results of basic research on choice responding can help to account for human behavior in natural environments and improve clinical assessments and interventions.

Examination of Relative Reinforcement Effects of Stimuli Identified Through Pretreatment and Daily Brief Preference Assessments

“…A common criticism of recent studies on stimulus preference and reinforcer assessment methods is that the dependent measures involved simple free-operant responses that were not socially meaningful and required little effort (e.g., switch pressing; Fisher & Mazur, 1997;Tustin, 1994). The current results show that preferences identified via a structured interview (the RAISD) and a simple choice response (naming or touching one stimulus from an array) identified stimuli that maintained responding on vocational (envelope stuffing, towel folding) and academic (reading, solving addition problems) tasks.…”

Toward Effective and Preferred Programming: A Case for the Objective Measurement of Social Validity with Recipients of Behavior-Change Programs

“…The opportunity to choose, in general, is usually reinforcing because it results in greater access to items and contexts that are momentarily or typically valuable to the person choosing (Fisher & Mazur, 1997). Furthermore, studies on the value of choosing show that the opportunity to choose, in and of itself, is highly reinforcing, in that children will work much more for conditions involving the opportunity to choose even when the same outcome is available for much less effort (Schmidt, Hanley, & Layer, 2009;Thompson, Fisher, & Contrucci, 1998;Tiger, Hanley, & Hernandez, 2006).…”

The Matching Law: A Tutorial for Practitioners

“…Behaviorally speaking, choice is regarded as the distribution of behavior to reinforcement alternatives (see Fisher & Mazur, 1997). In this sense, a "choice" is nothing more than the emission of a particular response in lieu of others.…”