Operant Conditioning

[Me2]

Hi,
For those of you who have read the thread on classical conditioning, I just wanted to share the results I've had so far in my Self administered Operant Conditioning experiment.
I kept trrack of my picking for 4 days before introducing any rewards or punishers for picking.
Day one: 45 minutes
Day two: 2.5 hours
Day three: 1 hour
Day four: 30 minutes

My goal was to reduce my skin picking to 10 minutes per day (although none would be perfectly acceptable).
Stimulus Changes: I rearranged my picking environment by changing my bathroom around. i also moisturized my skin every day so that I wouldn't be tempted by dry skin/scabs.

Rewards: Strong mint tea whenever I found myself able to resist an urge. this was great because it is relaxing to have a cup of tea and because the mint flavour became attached to good behavior. i also had a cup of mint tea whenever I felt self congratulatory about not picking. I'm happy to say that I drank a lot of tea this week.

At 10 oclock @ night each day, if I had picked for ten minutes or less, I made myself a delicious fruit salad. I chose this because there is a lot of methodical peeling and chopping involved which I thought would be a good replacement for any picking I might try to sneek in before bed time.

Punishers: I made a chart and hung it on the fridge where I could post my picking minutes for each day. I live with my boyfriend so this was definitely a strong deterent. On days where I had low picking minutes, this also served as a reward because my boyfriend was proud of me-which is cool because he doesn't usually know what kind of picking day I've had.

This reward/punisher section of the experiment was 7 days long.

Results:
Day one: 5 minutes
Day two: 35 minutes
Day three: 0 minutes
Day four: 10 minutes
Day five: 0 minutes
Day six: 35 minutes
Day seven: 0 minutes

mean picking minutes:12.14 minutes.
mean picking minutes before rewards/punishers:71.25 minutes.

I didn't reach my goal, but what an awsome week I've had!

The next part of the experiment is to remove the rewards and punishers and see what happens for three days. Then I have to write a paper.

Hope I haven't bored you all... I'll let you know what Happens in the next three days. ( i might need some help).

[scarreddaisy]

wow that is an awesome idea!~ I was thinking of how i cold do somethign similar for myself... I once i have a cahnce to take a breather from school ( which at the present moment is kicking my butt!) I will have to do something like that... my rewards can be I will do something for myself and my punishment I could have to tell my bf if I pick... he would totally go along with that... and how embarrasing would that be? Very.. that would steer me away from picking ... wow.. I feel very motivated right now... Awesome post! You didnt bore me one bit! ;D

[Me2]

Scarreddaisy,
It's a good idea to choose the right time to do something like this. I was able to do try it by making sure I had a lot of support. I told my parents, bf, 2 best friends and my counselor about it.
However, if you think it may help you, definitely make some time to try it.
I don't know how I'll be for the next few days without rewards and punishers. I may spend the rest of my life sipping mint tea and peeling kiwis.

Some important points for opperant conditioning:
1) Give yourself an alternate response! You need to have something that you can choose to do instead of picking. you can tie this in eith your rewareds. ie:make tea or go for a walk.
2)Make your rewards simple and easy to administer anywhere. (I was gonna use ice cream, but i dont think I need to be eating ice cream all day).
3)Reward yourself everytime you succeed, several times per day. If you screw up a little bit, all is not lost. There must always be another chance to succeed later.

As for school, it's kicking my ass too. Well actually just biology is. Good luck to you!

[angelkiss]

Me2, what a great idea! you sound so motivated. i'm sure you can overcome CSP with that kind of attitude and a plan :-)

[snout63]

Hi!
First off, congrats to you! Second, I have a question. I have been pick free or very close to it for 2 weeks, but I still fight the urge everyday. Will this sort of thing that you're doing eventually get rid of the urges or will they always be there?

Snout63

[Zoner]

Awesome Idea Me2-
I actually think I'm going to try that. I especially like logging in you time. I think when I see how much I do it, that'll be a huge deterrent.
I also tend to be pretty competitive- so seeing something posted on my fridge will definately keep me going.
Thanks!

[Me2]

Hey guys!
(in canada we call everyone guys- hope you're ok with that)
Thanks for all of the support! I am pretty motivated to reduce the time I spend picking. As for the experiment... The last part of the experiment was to remove all of the punishers and rewards. I am back to about an hour to an hour and a half per day. sigh. BUT, all that means to me is that I didn't get to condition myself for a long enough time. I was still in a learning phases called "shaping". I was only beginning to learn what was expected of me so that I could be rewarded. Also, My rewards were small. Using small rewards leads to slow learning but longer persistence of the learned behavior. I'm starting again on sunday for one month. Same rewards, same punishers. @ the end of four weeks if I am reduced to 10 minutes, I'm getting a facial at a spa (just the nice, perfumy kind; not the blackhead removal kind).

Snout63, I don't know for sure if it will last forever once I give it a longer trial. In theory, learned behaviour is fairly permanent as long as you reinforce it every once in awhile. Also as long as you don't do anything which would cause "extinction" (unlearning). An example would be if after a long time pick free or very little picking, I end up stressed out about something and choose to pick for relaxation because I remember that it made me feel better. Of course it would, in the short term term, and that would end up reinforcing my picking behaviour and causing extinction to the learning of having mint tea and making fruit salad instead. So, I guess what I'm saying is that there is probably an element of will power and also I need to make sure that I always have an alternate response (make tea or something). You've gotta give yourself a way out of the behaviour.

Blah blah blah. I hope that made some sense.

If anyone is going to try some Operant Conditioning, I'd like to hear about it! Your counselor or psychologist can probably help you to make a plan that will work for you.

One day at a time, right?

[FarmGirl]

Wow Me2! This is an incredibly interesting post! You said your writing a paper on your experiment--is that for school? I admire your courage

It's amazing how much time we waste doing the picking isn't it?

I look forward to hearing about your next part of your experiment goes! Thank you for sharing and best wishes