The effects of non-contingent punishment on subsequent task performance, psychological response, and physiological activity

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  • Saito Keisuke
    Department of Child Education, Tokai University Junior College
  • Tomaka Joe
    College of Health Sciences, The University of Texas at El Paso

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Abstract

<p>  This study examined the effect of non-contingent feedback on task performance, psychological response, motivation, and physiological activity. It also examined the effects on performance of a subsequent task. To assess task performance, choice reaction time task was employed. Thirty participants were assigned to either receive contingent feedback (i.e., rewards and punishments that were linked to their correct and incorrect reactions: CF) or non-contingent punishment feedback (i.e., always caused punishments to reactions: NCPF) and experienced each feedback during the priming task period. In the subsequent task period, all participants performed the same task which had contingent feedback. Results indicated that task performance was reliably worse in the NCPF group than in the CF group during both the priming task period (p < .01) and the contingent task period (p < .05). The scores of psychological measures indicated that the NCPF group had lower motivation to task than the CF group after both task periods (both p < .05). Blood pressure differed between the groups (p < .05) with the NCPF group having lower mean arterial pressure during the priming task period, however, there was no significant difference during the contingent task period. The NCPF group might have experienced activation of the behavioral inhibition system (BIS; Gray, 1987) not only in the priming task period but also in the contingent task period despite the absence of non-contingent feedback. It could be interpreted as the effect of non-contingent feedback carried over into subsequent period psychologically and behaviorally but not physiologically, despite a change in reward contingencies.</p>

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