Chaney

• Operant conditioning is learning through the consequences of behaviour. Positive reinforcement is the process that behaviour is learnt through rewards.
• Skinner showed how rats can be taught to press a lever to be rewarded with food.
• Doctors often have to deal with poor adherence to medical regimes such as the use of inhalers, research suggests that as little as 50% of children use their inhaler correctly. Chaney wanted to improve medical adherence by introducing positive reinforcement to the inhalers.
• Chaney aimed to investigate whether a funhaler could provide positive reinforcement to improve adherence in child asthmatics compared to normal inhalers.
• He studied 32 children (22 male 10 female) from Perth, Australia. They had all been asthmatic for at least 2 years.
• Procedure:

  • Parents were contacted by phone, then visited at home to explain the purpose of the study to gain informed consent,
  • They were interviewed using a questionnaire (yes/no responses) about their child's current usage of the inhaler, characteristics of the child, and compliance of the child and parents,
  • They were given the funhaler (whistle and spinner for when the child correctly uses it) over a 2 week period with adult supervision,
  • Parents were randomly called asking if they had used it the previous day. They were then given a repeat of the questionnaire.
• Findings:

  • 81% of parents had medicated their child with the funhaler the previous day compared to 59% for old inhaler,
  • 30% more children took the recommended 4 deep breaths with the funhaler compared to the old inhaler.
• Chaney concluded that operant conditioning (positive reinforcement) is useful for managing the medical regimes of young asthmatics, and the use of self-reinforcement strategies can improve the health of children.