Hi everyone, welcome to understanding behavior and its contingencies. So these are sort of the terminology and some of the stuff we will go over. Behavior occurs in response to stimuli. So there's a initial stimuli and then the behavior occurs and then there's a consequence for that behavior. And we know this is known as a three-term contingency. The three things are the stimulus, the antecedent, the thing that happens before the behavior, the behavior itself, the observable, measurable action, and then the consequence, an event that follows the behavior which can reinforce, punish, or ignore the behavior. We're going to learn this is we're this is known as this three term contingency and it's a lot of what our interventions are based off of. So it's very clear that we know why this behavior occurred and what our interventions are. It's modifying either those stimuli so the behavior does not occur or behaviors we want to see do occur or modifying the consequences for the same reason. So the behavior is reduced or if it's a behavior we want to see more of we modify the consequences so that behavior occurs more often. So the anticene is anything in the environment that might influence behavior and there can be multiple antecedants for a single behavior. They come before the behavior and can set the occasion acting as antecedants to the response. So, you know, an example of this is a child walks in a room and mom's like doing dishes, but there's a cookie jar next to mom and the child can't reach the cookie jar on their own. So, they ask, "Can I have a cookie?" Because they know that because mom's there, there's access to those cookies, which is reinforcing to them. So, it's literally anything. Other examples of this is you know storefront you're hungry and the behavior is going to be ordering food and eating but the store an open sign is an antecedent for you to walk in and order and if it's closed you're not going to do that. So it's it can be anything in the environment. Behavior is the response. So the response is the observable measurable behavior that follows the antecedent and the behavior can be reinforced or punishment or ignored depending on the consequence but it's the actual action the person is engaging in answering questions on a test making the first step is like what is the behavior in this conting in this three term contingency and a lot of time the questions will be worded in a way that will is trying to maybe almost confuse you about what the behavior behavior is if you can identify what the behavior is then you can answer the question well let's say you're a supervisor a higher level BCBA the parents are like I have a lot of trouble like the first thing we want to do is what are the problem behaviors and then once we know these problem behaviors we're going to look at what are the anticedants and consequences of these behaviors modify those and maybe find replacement behaviors consequences are anything that follows the event that determines whether it will increase or decrease in the future. Consequences can be reinforcing, strengthening behavior or punishing, weakening behavior. And we'll talk about this more, how people misuse the term punishment so much. For it to be a consequence, it must happen after the behavior. If it happens before, it's an antecedent. Sometimes consequences are neutral. They happen after the behavior because the behavior occurred, but they don't have an effect on the behavior. If they increase the behavior, it's a reinforcement. And if it's something that makes a person engage in that behavior less in the future, then it's a punishment. I'll give you an example of each. This is the three term contingency stimulus. Anything in the environment that influences behavior, the response, the observable, measurable action, and the consequence. Whatever follows the behavior that has an effect on it. So when it's neutral, we don't call it a consequence, which I know I just said it's confusing, but things happen right after a behavior because that behavior occurred but have no effect on the behavior. I'll give you some examples of this. If you're in a supermarket with a child and the child sees the candy bar in the aisle, supermarkets and marketing are using principles to get you to buy things. Putting the candy and the little stuff right at the checkout does increase how much people purchase that stuff. Okay, so the child sees the candy bar and so they start screaming and the mom buys them the candy bar and gives them the candy bar. So let's set that all up. The antecedent is that candy bar. They see it. It's in the environment. The behavior is screaming or crying for it. And then the reinforcement, the mom giving them the candy bar, now they're more likely in the future to cry for a candy bar. That's the stimulus response consequence. It describes all behavior. For example, if it was a more positive behavior, just asking for a candy bar, they see the candy bar, there's the antecedent, they go, "Mom, may I have a candy bar?" The mom says yes, and they buy them the candy bar. If it was the screaming, once they get that candy bar, they're more likely to scream in the future for a candy bar. And if it's the asking for a candy bar, they're more likely to ask for a candy bar in the future. So, we can utilize this to increase positive behavior or negative behavior, whatever you want to call. I hate saying bad behaviors, good behaviors, because no behavior is bad or good. It's just all communication and like person getting what they want. And so I like calling it like behaviors we'd like to see again and behaviors we don't want to see again. And so there's an example and let's do it from the mom's perspective which is always interesting. So the mom's in the checkout line they're in public which is you know you like your child to behave nice in public. That's just something a lot of us moms like. So the child starts screaming. That's actually the antecedent for the mother's behavior of giving them the candy bar. So they're screaming. The mom gets embarrassed. So the mom hands them a candy bar. The screaming stops. That's the consequence. And so now the mom's more likely in the future to give them a candy bar when they scream. So it's just that example is negative reinforcement. And then the other example with the child is positive reinforcement. We'll talk a lot more about that. So stimulus, the antecedent, we have the behavior and the consequence and then everything we do is based on this three-term contingency. There is a four-term contingency where we put motivating operation in front of it. We're basically splitting up anticedants into two different types and then making it into a lot four term contingency. There's two different types of anticedants. You can use either. It doesn't matter. But you have to really understand these. What I would do right now is start thinking about behaviors. Dogs are pets are kind of the easiest or young children. And just go, I saw that behavior. What's the anticy and what's the consequence? And just start trying to identify them throughout your life. Not change anything. Just identify. Like my dog, for example, will come and stand. He's large and he'll stand over the bed and stare at me when he wants his heated bed and when he wants it on. So when him staring at me is the anticedent for my behavior, I go over and I turn on the bed, which is my behavior, and then he stops staring at me. Not that his staring super adversive, but it's like letting me know that he needs the bed on, and I want to do that for him. And so the consequence is him like, you know, giving me affection and lying down on his bed and not bugging anyone in the house. If I don't do it, he'll run around the house until someone does it. For him, when it's two people together, it's two behaviors. For him, the antecedent is he's cold. The behavior is him standing over showing me that he needs his pad on. And the consequence is me doing it. So, I turn on the pad. Now, stands over me and stares at me every time he wants that pad on. It's easy for me to recognize he's not bugging anyone, so I've rewarded it. But like if he barked at me, I might not turn on the pad because I don't want that to be his behavior to tell me his pad needs to be on. So that's how I'm modifying his environment. Look at your dog, your cat, your child. You can even go outside and look at birds. Watch some videos of dogs, too, if you don't have it. Try to start to identify some of those behaviors. These are key t takeaways. You really want to understand anticedants, modify antecedants, implement reinforcement, and then analyze those. ABC sequences.