What is Negative Punishment (Examples and Effectiveness)

In this article, we will review negative punishment, its definition, examples, and drawbacks.

American psychologist B.F. Skinner developed the theory of operant conditioning, which stated that a person or animal’s behavior could be increased or decreased by adding or removing appropriate stimuli after the behavior is exhibited.

The difference between classical conditioning and operant conditioning is that classical affects unconscious behavior, while operant affects conscious behavior.

Within operant, punishment aims to reduce a behavior while reinforcement increases a behavior. Punishment or reinforcement can be positive or negative. Positive and negative indicates whether it’s adding something (positive) or taking away something (negative).

The two types of punishment are positive punishment and negative punishment. The two types of reinforcement are positive reinforcement and negative reinforcement.

What Is Negative Punishment

Negative punishment, an operant conditioning technique, reduces a behavior or response by taking away a favorable stimulus following that action.

Because negative punishment procedures decreases the likelihood of the behavior occurring again by removing a stimulus, the stimulus must be pleasant or essential. The person or animal learns to associate the negative consequence with the behavior. This type of conditioning is also known as “punishment by removal.”

Negative Punishment Examples

There are many examples of negative punishment in everyday life. Losing privileges, being fined for violating the law, being grounded and losing access to the tablet are all common negative punishment examples.

1. Taking away a boy’s recess privilege to stop his disruption
2. Giving the driver a parking ticket (taking away money) to stop his illegal parking
3. A child’s screen time is cut to stop his tantrum
4. Taking away a teenager’s phone to stop the bad attitude
5. Charging a fee to stop people from paying their bills late
6. Remove attention by looking away to stop a dog from jumping onto the owner

Effectiveness of Negative Punishment

Negative punishment can be extremely effective when the following criteria are met: contingency, contiguity, and consistency.

Contingency

Contingency describes the dependent nature of the punishment on the behavior. If the punishment is applied whenever the target behavior appears, then the punishment depends on the appearance of the undesired behavior. If the stimulus removal happens whether the act appears or not, or before the behavior occurs, then it is less likely to work.

Continguity

Contiguity is the immediacy of the behavior and stimulus removal. If punishment is delayed, the suppression of behavior will not be as effective^​1​. When there is a significant gap between the behavior and stimulus removal, the association is weakened. In addition, other actions may appear in the meanwhile, and this behavior then mistakenly becomes the one being suppressed.

Consistency

Consistency is necessary for negative punishment to work. Consider speeding. People still regularly speed despite the possibility of receiving a traffic ticket because they don’t get one every time. They are only fined if they are caught, and that’s why it doesn’t work well in this case.

Side Effects of Negative Punishment

One problem of negative punishment is that it works for as long as the stimulus is consistently removed. But once the punishment stops, the undesired behavior is very likely to resume. Another drawback is, while it can stop an undesired behavior, it doesn’t provide information on what the desired action is.

Here’s an example of negative punishment causing an unintended problem. A student misbehaves in class and the teacher takes away his token gold star. This penalty may have a deterring effect on the conduct. But if a child is misbehaving because he is anxious or hyperactive, the punishment doesn’t teach the child how else to deal with the issue. This forceful behavior restraint may result in mental or emotional problems for the child^​2​.

Also See: Reinforcement Theory of Motivation

References