Incentive Motivation

• Goal object: incentive that motivates us
• Incentives: important for us to reach or avoid a goal; motivate behaviour o Learned

o Differ in value for us at diff moments and diff times o Thoughts: serve as incentive motivators

Concept of incentives as motivators shows that objects or events can influence our behaviour over physical needs

• Mediator (M): incentive motivation which comes between stimulus characteristics (S) of a goal object and the responses (R) directed toward that object o S  M  R; consists of 2 separate links: S  M and M  R
• Classical conditioning: M is established through this

Incentives as Energizers

• External objects goals (objects) also motivate behaviour
• Crespi’s study: when the large-reward group began getting smaller rewards, they immediately slowed down compared to the control group vs. when the smallreward group began getting larger rewards, they ran very quickly compared to the control group o Conclusion: diff incentive objects influence how hard the organism is willing to perform (vs. influencing what is learned by the organism)

Incentive Motivation (K)

• Incentive motivation (K): if a goal can influence behaviour before the goal is reached, organisms anticipate the availability of the goal o This anticipation motivates the organism to behave in ways to get the goal

Hull-Spence and r_g-s_r

• Consummatory response (R_g): measures value of goal object o e. in good, large reward = more vigorous chewing and swallowing
• Stimuli in goal box while present when R_g occurs (i.e. colour of the walls) becomes associated with it and after a few trials, stimuli will elicit R_g directly o These stimuli may also occur before organism reaches goal box
• Partial consummatory response/fractional anticipatory response r_g: elicited by stimuli similar to those in goal box, which does not interfere w/important responses (i.e. running) in order t reach food i.e. small chewing movement
• Partial response stimulus feedback s_g: sensory feedback in the form of stimuli inform the organism that it is making r_g’s
• Fractional anticipatory response mechanism/r_g-s_g mechanism: motivates responses in order to get goal box and engage in Rg; mechanical explanation
• Organisms appear more motivated near their goal (i.e. run faster) b/c when coming near goal area, more stimuli should occur that have been associated w/R_g, and thus r_g-r_s should increase and increasingly motivate behaviour – If stimuli are diff in beginning than at goal:

o Stimuli that become associated w/R_g and thus develop r_g-s_g do not have to be external to the organism

i.e. sensations we feel when we are hungry are with us from start to goal; they are present when R_g occurs, so they also elicit r_g

r_g-s_g is a peripheral explanation of incentive motivation and r_g is a minute muscular response

• Trying to measure and locate r_g was never successful

The Persistence of Behaviour

Asmel and r_f-s_f

• Interested in what happens when a rat reaches a goal where it has been rewarded in the past and now finds nothing
• Unlearned frustration R_f: occurs in situation above
• Partial/anticipatory frustration response (r_f): stimuli present at time R_f occurs becomes associated with it and these stimuli also occur earlier in the sequence of events o Organism usually stops its present behaviour and engages in another behaviour
• Frustration response stimulus feedback r_g-s_g: organism knows it is making these responses b/c of feedback stimuli
• Competing responses: result of frustration from non-reward; takes organism off in new and possibly adaptive direction
• If competing responses are difficult to make and original responses are followed by reward in the past: o Counterconditioning: motivation resulting from frustration of non-reward gets channeled into the response that causes frustration
  • Competing responses that would normally develop b/c of this frustration are countered by the situation and the motivation becomes conditioned to the only responses that can easily occur: the responses leading to the sometimes reward-filled goal box
  • R_s-f_s mechanism: motivator for ongoing behaviour, just as r_g-s_g would under other circumstances
• When will circumstance above occur:

o Partial reinforcement schedule (PRF): sometimes rat’s responses are rewarded with food and sometimes they are not rewarded at all

• Continuous reinforcement schedule (CRF): rats reinforced on a PRF schedule persist to respond longer when the reinforcer is taken away (extinction) than when they have been reinforced for every response o One of best established psychology phenomenon – How frustration theory accounts for this persistence:
  • During training the CRF group, is rewarded on every trial, which should build up r_g-s_g and motivate responses for reaching the goal
  • For the PRF group, r_g-s_g builds up more slowly on rewarded training trials and r_g-s_g also builds up on unrewarded trials

Initially, these leads to competing responses (less/slower behaviour) which would eventually die out b/c they always went unreinforced

 

(extinguished) and r_f-s_f would become counter-conditioned to the same response that r_g-s_g is activating

• For the PRF group. We have 2 sources of incentive motivation on every tria: (1) r_g-s_g (built up on rewarded trials) and (2) r_f-s_f: (built up on unrewarded trials)
• Since the competing responses by r_f-s_f have been extinguished, the incentive motivation generated by r_f-s_f will become channeled into whatever responses can occur) responses leading to goal b/c they are sustained by r_g-s_g)
• In extinction the CRF group responds and goes unrewarded o This leads to R_f and thus to r_f-s_f and the development of competing responses
• If the reward has been permanently removed, the incentive effects of r_g-s_g will die out quickly and become replaced by r_f-s_f and competing responses
• Thus, continuously reinforced animals stop responding pretty quickly vs. the PRF group has 2 sources of motivation that have been connected to the responses no longer being rewarded
• The r_g-s_g part will die out, but the responding will continue longer in this group n/c it is sustained by the motivation generated by r_f-s_f
• Thus, Amsel’s approach provides an explanation of why PRF responses are more persistent than CRF responses
• This effect is called the partial extinction effect (PREE): channeling frustration (i.e. from getting both good and bad marks on a test you study hard for) into the only behaviour that sometimes pays off (studying); this effect is the rule rather than the exception
• Frustration will channel into ongoing behaviour and make it more persistent if that behaviour has been rewarded at some time in the part; otherwise it will lead to competing behaviour that will reduce persistence

• Experiment by Amsel: rats ran from start box to goal box 1 where they were fed and then to goal box 2 to get more good o Food was then sometimes taken away from goal box 1
  • Result: leads to R_f: faster running from goal box 1 to 2 on non-reinforced trials
  • Conclusion: non-reward following a response that has been regularly reinforced in the past energizes behaviour
• Experiment testing is non-reward leads to competing behaviour: when extinction occurred (food was withheld), for both groups, the frustration of non-reward led to new responses:
  • Rats allowed to retrace path: developed new response that competed w/old running response and they extinguished quickly
  • Rats allowed to jump out: no competition between this response and the running response and they extinguished much more slowly

Study showing strong support for energizing effects of frustration and the incorporation of this behaviour into behaviours present at the time frustration occurs:

1. Phase 1: animals in the 3 partially reinforced groups experienced frustration on the non-reinforced trials and the resulting r_f-s_f became conditioned to the whichever response the rats had to learn to get the coal (running, jumping or climbing)
2. Phase 2: reinforced 100% of time o For the rats taught to run in phase 1: frustration reinstated during extinction lead to increased persistence, b/c running was the correct response in phase 2, and r_f-s_f should channel into the ongoing response
   • For the rats taught to jump in phase 1: reinstitution of frustration by extinction will interfere w/running and reduce resistance to extinction
   • For the rats taught to climb in phase 1: reinstitution of frustration will call up the climbing response, which interfered w/running response, causing extinction to occur quickly

• The effects of this channeling on behavioural persistence depends on relationship of energized response to the response being extinguished o Energized response leads to greater or reduced resistance depending on whether it facilitates or hinders the response undergoing extinction
• Amsel saw frustration theory as part of a more general theory of persistence o Persistence develops whenever organism learns to approach or continue responding despite stimuli that would normally disrupt that behaviour b/c disruptive stimuli become counterconditioned (channel) to ongoing response in the situation

o Emotional responses and their consequent feedback stimuli are sometimes disruptive, but they can also eventually become counterconditioned to ongoing behaviour

• Amsel’s theory described the motivating properties of the removal of an unexpected incentive; it does not deal directly w/the positively motivating properties of incentive availability, which assumes is covered by the r_g-s_g mechanism

Incentives as Generators of Emotion

• Mowrer proposed that incentive motivation mediates between stimulus and response by creating emotional states

Mowrer: Fear, Hope, Relief and Disappointment

• Argued incentive motivation is the primary instigator of behaviour – Incentive motivation are closely tied to the learning of emotional responses – Four primary emotions:

1. Fear: caused by increase in drive (i.e. motivation, food deprivation)

Emotional responses associated w/fear become connected to any stimuli present at the time the emotion occurs

• After multiple pairings, stimuli becomes cues that signal the approach of an increase in drive  creates fear before actual arrival of increased drive state
• This conditioned fear motivates the organism to make whatever responses it can to remove itself from the situation containing the fear cues

–     Role of reinforcement: activate 1 of 4 emotions vs. influencing responses directly; thus, learning alters what organism wants to do vs. what organism can do

2. Hope: caused by decrease in drive (i.e. full stomach) o Any cues present at the time hope occurs become associated w/emotion and begin to serve as signals that a decrease in drive (hope) is clos

o Thus, again Mowrer saw behaviour as activated by emotional incentive o Stimuli that produce emotion of hope will activate behaviours that keep organism in their presence, while stimuli associated w/fear will activate avoidance behaviours

3. Disappointment: happens when hope cues that predict a decrease in drive do not actually lead to reduction in drive o Negative state (like fear)

o Motivates behaviour that will have effect of removing cues that signal disappointment

4. Relief: happens when cues that signal an increase in drive (fear) are taken away

i.e. bell ending hard lab class

• Emphasized importance of emotion as a mediator between stimulus characteristics of incentive objects and important behaviour o Thus, rewards and punishers create emotion
• Cues associated w/triggering of emotion eventually become capable of triggering the emotion before the emotion-producing event

o The activation of this anticipatory emotion directs behaviour toward or away from objects in the environment

• Difficulty w/Mowrer’s approach: does not explain how behaviour is triggered for the first time i.e. what causes rat to traverse maze the first time

Incentives as Carriers of Info

• Mowrer’s approach suggests that informational stimuli generate emotions that in turn lead to approach or withdrawal behaviour in the situation

Incentive motivation serves to mediate between stimulus and response b/c predictive stimuli create incentive motivation, which in turn directs appropriate responding

• Approaches differ from Mowrer’s in their emphasis: emotions are seen as cues that predict (provide info about) goal and direct behaviours toward that goal (vs. being instigators of behaviour)

Tolman: Cognitive Formulations

• Expectancies: caused incentive motivation
• Reductionism: reduce behaviour to smallest possible unit o But Tolman took a more holistic view by viewing behaviour as purposive: rats and humans develop expectations that particular behaviours lead to particular goals
• Incentives differ in value: diff goals have diff values for an organisms o Incentives control behaviour depending on their value
• Latent learning: reinforcement is not necessary for learning to occur and appropriate incentives are important for the performance of learning
• Experiment: rapid change in performance indicated that learning occurred during 1^st 10 trials, but was not apparent in performance until food incentive was introduced Expectancy
• Cognitive expectation: after several experiences w/a goal, the organism comes to expect that certain behaviours will lead to that goal in the future
• Changing incentives after an expectation has been acquired leads to a disruption of behaviour, especially fi the change is from a more demanded to a less demanded incentive
• Change provides evidence for existence of cognitive expectancies, demonstrated in experiments
  • Conclusion: disruption of the normal, learned behaviour of choosing the container under which the monkey had seen food placed indicated that a cognitive expectation of obtaining a bit of banana had developed
• Experiment showed: interaction of the physiological state w/incentive value of the goal
  • Female rat ran a maze in order to get her litter; but as litter got older and no longer nursed, the speed and accuracy of the female rat declined
  • Conclusion: the changed physiological state (of the mother rat) reduced the incentive value of the litter
• Presented a model of incentive motivation that emphasized the buildup of expectancies concerning the behaviours that will lead to certain goals o These expectancies energize and guide behaviour

o Positive incentives  approached and negative incentives  avoided

More highly values incentives energize behaviour more than less-values incentives

• When an expectancy is disconfirmed, behaviour is disrupted
• Incentives were central representations (thoughts) of the relationship between certain behaviours and the goals they led to
• Similarity in Mowrer and Tolman theories: both emphasizes cues (expectancies) important in the development of incentive motivation

Predictability

• Bolles and Moot proposed that cues become incentive motivators to the extent that they predict the arrival r withdrawal of some goal object
• Whether cue takes on motivational control (becomes incentive motivator) depends on whether it predicts some future event
• Predictability cues: motivate ongoing behaviour and reinforce completed responses; act as secondary reinforcers
• One way to make a cue predictive: pair it w/a reinforce such as food in a classical conditioning procedure o Each time stimulus is presented, so is food
  • Once stimulus has been paired w/reinforce for several trials, we can change the situation so that vas-press response is required in order to obtain food
  • If bar-pressing is facilitated by the presence of the cue, there is an incentive effect of the cue
  • These experiments involving transfer-of-control obtain facilitation
• Bolles and Moot noted that cues associated w/food facilitate performance of an operant response, while cues predicting the withdrawal of food have a demotivating effect o Suggests: we may find ourselves unmotivated to perform certain behaviours b/c the cues associated w/the task predict a lack of success (and not the actual task)

The Overmier and Lowry Model

• Noted that informational explanation cannot account for all that is known about mediation effects in transfer-of-control experiments
• Suggested that incentives have both energizing and cueing effects o Thus, when cues associated w/a goal reappear at a later time or in a diff situation, they are thought to both energize behaviour and direct responding according to associations they gained earlier
• Informational aspects are more important in situations where these 2 aspects of an incentive compete for the control of behaviour

Secondary (conditioned) reinforcers: stimuli that are consistently associated w/reinforcement become reinforcers in their own right o Reinforcement serves to develop incentive motivation vs. strengthen S-R connections

o Thus, secondary reinforcers are also incentive motivators and should have both energizing and response selection properties

• Incentives are relative (depend on background events against which it is compared) vs. absolute

The Bindra Model

• Emphasized production of central motive state: activates goal-directed behaviours toward incentive objects
  • SMC is motivated whenever certain organismic conditions exist (i.e. change in hormone conditions) and organism is stimulated by properties of incentive object (odor, taste, visual or auditory stimuli)
  • Thus, orgasmic state (drive) and stimuli from goal object (incentive) combine to produce central motive state
• Said motivational and emotional states are the same, so this is also an emotion behaviour model
• Activation of central motive stat triggers innate sensory-motor coordinators (automatic) i.e. salivation or heart rate changes, that prepare the organism for contact with (or escape from) incentive object o e. central representation (memory) of stimulus of food properties activates instrumental approach behaviours and on contact w/food, consummatory behaviours such as chewing and swallowing
• Incentive stimuli serve both energizing and directional functions o Direction is accomplished by stimuli associated w/goal object (food) and serves to select the proper behaviours (approach, chewing and swallowing) rather than other possible responses
• Neutral stimuli can become incentives through simple pairing w/other incentives that already arouse the central motive state
• How stimulus can demotivate behaviour: if certain stimulus S1 always predicts absence of stimulus S2, which is characteristic of some highly preferred goal, since S1 predicts absence of S2, S1 will suppress central motive state o Unless certain motive state is present, behaviour will not occur
• Positive incentive  approach behaviour vs. negative incentive  avoidance behaviour

Klinger: Meaningfulness

• Meaningfulness: provided by incentive toward which people work; people are motivated to behave in ways in order to obtain the incentives b/c they create meaningful life

Most meaningful in people’s lives: family, children, clos relationships

Incentives and Goals

• Incentives: valued objects or events; not always willing to obtain everything that has incentive value vs. goals: something individual is willing to put in effort to obtain
• Current concern: goals that require commitment to obtain and are not easy to give up

Disengagement Phases

• Disengagement: occurs when goal is unattainable; involves shifting of behaviour through series of phases:

1. Invigoration: individual first becomes single-minded and stronger b/c blocked incentives are attractive
2. Primitivization: since efforts do not succeed, behaviour becomes more stereotyped and primitive until it becomes destructive
3. Aggression: responding becomes more primitive until it becomes aggressive
4. Depression: happens when all attempts to reach goal fail o Become uninterested in incentives that usually influence them and are unmotivated in social interactions
5. Recovery: success in obtaining other goals may stimulate recovery from depression

Grief as Disengagement

–    4 dimensions in working through grief process:

1. Shock or numbness: decision-making is hard; individual may show panic, distress and anger
2. Yearning and searching: restlessness, ager or ambiguity; often asks “How can this be?”
3. Disorientation and disorganization: involves depression and feelings of guilt’ thoughts like “Did I do all I could?”
4. Resolution and reorganizing: gradually, griever begins to put (death of loved one, for ex.) into perspective and begins to behave more competently

• Similar to Klinger’s disengagement phases; he would view mourning as example of disengaging from an important lost incentive (loved one)
• Individual w/many important incentives is expected to deal w/loss of loved one better

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