Andy has recently been employed in a factory where plastic cutlery is boxed and shipped. Andy's job is to check every 3rd box to ensure the correct number of knives, spoons, or forks are included. Andy's boss wants him to increase his overall speed (the number of boxes checked per hour) now that he has reached a 100% accuracy rate. Andy's job coach suggests the boss require Andy to increase his

Question

number of boxes checked by 1 per hour (4 per day) in one week increments. If Andy reaches his quota for 5 consecutive work days, he will be rewarded with a bonus of $20 to be implemented permanently when he reaches and maintains his final quota of 20 boxes checked per hour for 3 weeks.

Assume Andy's boss decides it would be better to offer Andy praise for improving his performance each hour, day, and week and then provide a one-time $100 bonus when he reaches his criterion. Would this change your response as to what design was being implemented? Explain your response.

Answer 1

The basic design (changing criterion does not change). The nature of the reinforcement does change. The changes in the reinforcement could, of course, have different effects than the $20 per week bonus reinforce as in this case, reinforcement is delivered more frequently and there is a different type (praise) as well as different level (one-time $100 bonus) of reinforcement being used.