Comments on: Negative Reinforcement Is Not Punishment

By: family lawyers doncaster

family lawyers doncaster — Fri, 17 Jun 2011 07:19:30 +0000

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By: Blogosaurus

Blogosaurus — Mon, 06 Jul 2009 03:33:47 +0000

Ahh. I think I see the difference – feedback vs. reinforcement. Reinforcement always makes the thing (behaviour or whatever) happen more, whether it’s positive or negative. Negatie feedback probably equates, metaphorically speaking, to punishment.

By: Lara

Lara — Sun, 05 Jul 2009 22:31:58 +0000

From a mechanical or electrical engineering point of view, negative feedback works to inhibit the force that triggered it. For example, on an automated train system, you would set upper and lower limits for the speed. If the speed exceeds the upper limit, it would trigger negative feedback to slow it down. If it is less than the lower limit, it would trigger negative feedback to speed it up.

Positive feedback works to enhance the force that triggered it. In the above example, if it exceeded the upper limit of the speed, the positive feedback would work to speed the train up even more. Each subsequent check of the system would indicate that it was above the upper limit, and increase the speed. Which is why positive feedback loops are inherently unstable.

Whenever I use those phrases on my LJ, my smart ass engineering friends make geeky jokes about feedback loops. Which I tried to avoid.

By: Blogosaurus

Blogosaurus — Sun, 05 Jul 2009 07:27:10 +0000

Don’t be silly, it’s four.

By: Blogosaurus

Blogosaurus — Sun, 05 Jul 2009 07:26:52 +0000

Hmmm. I would say “meat brings pain” is best classified as a punishment, since it is an aversive stimulus that makes you less likely to eat meat. And “I am smart to avoid pain” is from negative reinforcement, the cessation of bad feelings in your body after eating meat.

Pos. and neg. feedback might mean something different though. Does feedback have some technical engineering meaning or is it just “comments about your work”? If the latter I assume negative feedback is just criticism (punishment) and positive feedback is reward (positive reinforcement)?

By: Jim

Jim — Sun, 05 Jul 2009 04:30:10 +0000

You are henceforth known as Laraack. Is that 2 or 3 syllables?

By: Lara

Lara — Sun, 05 Jul 2009 01:14:13 +0000

Crap, I don’t know how those extraneous characters were added to my name. Blech.

By: Laraack" and

Laraack" and — Sun, 05 Jul 2009 01:13:04 +0000

Oddly enough, I used those phrases in my post the other day because I get chided by my electrical engineering friends for misusing “positive feedback” and “negative feedback”. I’m not sure what to call the “meat is actually pretty gross, gosh how smart I am to avoid it” feeling and the “meat brings pain” feeling.