NIGHT TRAINING THROUGH PARENTS' IMPLICIT USE OF OPERANT CONDITIONING

Abstract

BENJAMIN, LORNA S.; SERDAHELY, WILLIAM; and GEPPERT, THOMAS V. Night Training through Parents' Implicit Use of Operant Conditioning. CHILD DEVELOPMENT, 1971, 42, 963-966. 90 parents rated their youngest night-trained child on a questionnaire describing parent-child interactions concerning learning to be dry at night. Results supported the hypothesis that the operant conditioning model was implicitly used in night training, and suggested the most effective reinforcers were hugging and kissing. Negative interpersonal reinforcers-such as shaming, rejecting, spanking, and name calling-signficantly retarded learning.