In operant conditioning, how does a consequence affect a person’s behavior?

• A. It changes the likelihood that the behavior will occur again in the future (increases with reinforcement, decreases with punishment).
• B. It influences behavior only if the consequence occurs immediately after the behavior and is always pleasant.
• C. It produces an automatic, reflexive response that is unrelated to voluntary behavior.
• D. It primarily changes the person’s thoughts about the behavior but does not affect how often the behavior occurs.

Answer: (A)

Verified step by step guidance

1. Step 1: Understand the basic principle of operant conditioning, which is a learning process where behaviors are influenced by their consequences.
2. Step 2: Recognize that consequences can be either reinforcements or punishments, which respectively increase or decrease the likelihood of a behavior occurring again.
3. Step 3: Note that the timing of the consequence is important; it should follow the behavior closely to effectively influence future behavior.
4. Step 4: Differentiate operant conditioning from classical conditioning, where automatic reflexive responses are involved, whereas operant conditioning deals with voluntary behaviors.
5. Step 5: Conclude that the key effect of a consequence in operant conditioning is to change the probability that the behavior will be repeated, not just to influence thoughts or feelings about the behavior.