Effects of Accuracy of Instructions on Human Behavior: Correspondence with Reinforcement Contingencies Matters

Abstract

Subjects were assigned to one of four groups in which they received instructions about how to respond on a schedule of reinforcement. Instructions informed subjects as to which of two keys to respond on to earn points. Percentage of accuracy of instructions were held constant for each condition but varied across the three conditions for each group; the percentage of accuracy level within each condition for the four groups was: 0-50-100, 100-50-0, 60-50-40, and 40-50-60 percent. The results were summarized as follows: (1) Instruction-following was highly correlated with the accuracy of the instructions; (2) variability in instruction-following was related to how reliable the instructions were; and (3) instruction-following was affected by accuracy of the instructions subjects received in previous conditions. These results were interpreted to suggest that instructional control can be accounted for via the three-term contingency and that the source of instructional control lies in the contingencies of reinforcement and not the instructions themselves.