Behavior modification occurs in the natural environment and is also implemented intentionally by humans. The consequences of behavior modification result in changes to behaviors; when intentionally performed a specific behavior is targeted to be increased or decreased. According to National Youth website, behavior modification was developed by Pavlov, a behavioral psychologist, in the early twentieth century; the general technique uses rewards and/or punishments to modify behaviors. At times, unintended consequences, as well as, intended consequences result from behavior modification.
Decrease
Changing behaviors can result in a decrease or extinction of a behavior. Behavior modification can decrease an undesirable behavior through either the use of punishment, reinforcement or ignoring. A natural behavior modification is when a person touches something that is hot he gets burned and that results in a painful experience. This pain is a natural form of punishment that, for most people, results in a reduction in the chances that they will knowingly touch something hot again in the future. When using behavior modification is it important to determine if the desired result is to limit or decrease the presence of a behavior or get rid of it entirely.
Increase
Behavior modification techniques can result in desired increases to specific behaviors. Reinforcers and/or punishers are applied to the situation in an effort to increase a behavior. For example, dogs are often taught to use the bathroom outside the owner's house by being punished when they use the bathroom in the house and being rewarded with praise and/or a treats when they use the bathroom outside. The key to increasing a behavior through behavior modification is to consistently pair the modifiers with the behavior a person wants to change.
Unintended
A consequence that results from poorly executed, inconsistent or inefficient behavior modification techniques are unintended changes to a person's behaviors, notes LD Online. When the reinforcement or punishment used to increase or decrease behaviors results in changes to other behaviors, unintended consequences have occurred, such as when a person tries to reduce an unwanted behavior; a child who is acting out, for example, but ends up reinforcing the negative behaviors. An example of this would be if a child only receives attention from adults when she is behaving badly; thus her negative behaviors increase so that she can receive more attention even though it is negative attention. In this case, a better way to modify the child's behavior is to focus on rewarding her positive behaviors and ignoring her negative behaviors.
