Dealing With Offender Behavior, Behavior Modification In Custody Flashcards
(9 cards)
What is behavioural modification based off
-The behaviourist approach, which states that all behaviour can be learnt and reinforced
-The programme aims to do this by rewarding good behaviour and punishing bad behaviour
Token economy
-Based on operant conditioning, the token economy rewards good behaviours with a token which can be exchanged for some kind of reward
-Managed and coordinated by the prison staff
-Not hitting other inmates, being respectful to staff
-Extra food/phone calls.
What are tokens
Secondary reinforcers since they derived value from their association with the reward
How is negative behaviour punished
-Removal of tokens and the associated privileges
-Starting an inmate fight, stealing food
How do you form a token economy
-Identify the desirable behaviour
-operationalise and break down these behaviours into small increments
-establish a score that both the inmates and staff know of
-enforce the regime and standardize the procedure
Little rehabilitative value
-Blakburn -behavior modification has ‘little rehabilitative value’
-There is no reinforcement for law abiding behaviour in the outside world
-Often bad behaviour is positively reinforced by social pressures and gangs
-Any positive changes to behaviour is lost
Supporting research for long term effects
-Hobbs and Holt
-3 delinquent programmes had a token economy and 1 didn’t as a control
-Significant difference in positive behaviour for token economy
Cost effective/easy to implement
-Much easier to implement than other programmes like anger management.
-Can be implemented over the entire institution
Counter to easy to implement
-Basset and Blanchard
-All of the rehabilitative effects are lost if staff are inconsistent in applying tokens
-This is due to factors like high staff turnover and lack of appropriate training
