Two-factor theory

When motivation became the object of scientific study, the same kind of exceptions to rational choice soon became apparent. Pavlov came up with the most robust solution—conditioned behavior, refined to conditioned motives, stated definitively in . H. Mowrer s two-factor theory (1947).1 In this form, Plato s passions seemed discernible in parametric research, and the ancient dual model was perpetuated. 

Loewenstein covers the main tenets of two-factor theory and advances it 1 use his recent work to represent this approach in my critique. He describes these properties ... 

This model fits the self-reports of addicts and the common experience of people trying to give up bad habits generally. The model is certainly time-honored. However, close examination suggests that the dichotomies it rests on are only casual rules of thumb, which people use to decide how difficult certain experiences will be to control, rather than basic distinctions. I argue that modem behavioral research and simple logic demote this model from the explanatory to the merely descriptive. Let us look at the tenets of two-factor theory one by one ... 

In two-factor theory, hungers and other appetites must be elicited by stimuli that are outside of the person s control. If the theory s other assumptions were true, this tenet would be both possible and necessary. It would be possible because two-factor theory holds appetites to be special kinds of processes that initially depend on innate releasing stimuli but that can come to be elicited by arbitrary cues through pairing alone. It would be necessary in the case of aversive appetites, because, with conventional exponential discounting, there is no other mechanism to make a person generate them. The easiest cure for fear... 

Surprise-based two-factor theory is diagramed in the discount curves of figure 7.1. Say that an event at time t T (food, the opportunity for sex, an occasion for anger, and so on) makes available a reward that will have magnitude 50 if subjects have not previously developed an appetite, and... 

This one-factor theory has implications for the therapy of addiction and other self-destructive urges. Two-factor theory demands counterconditioning of the cues that give rise to craving, a method that has not worked well (Powell et a). 1990 Wilson 1978 Hunt and Matarazzo 1973 Lichtenstein and Danaher 1976 Clairbom, Lewis, and Humble 1972). The theory that I describe makes out the problem to be strategic. 

A two-factor theory requires appetites (or visceral factors) to be qualitatively distinct from reward-seeking mental processes, a distinction that does not stand up on close examination. Ultimately, there is no line that divides rewards from the stimuli that reinforce classical conditioning. The only reason that a separate conditioning principle has seemed necessary—to explain the imposition of negative visceral factors and the restraint of positive ones—can be removed by the hyperbolic shape of discounting the future. 

Addictive choices and other losses of self-control will often follow stimuli that occasion appetites for them, somewhat as Loewenstein describes. However, these appetites are better seen as reward-dependent processes that are part of the recursive self-prediction that Darwin and many others have elucidated rather than as the transferred reflexes of two-factor theory. Individuals can remember reward values with great accuracy but avoid rehearsing experiences like panic or drug craving lest they be lured back into them. Thus these experiences are often unreportable in practice. Once aroused, these processes function as self-confirming prophesies and, therefore, may seem both explosive and coercive. 

A one-factor theory based on hyperbolic discounting does not negate the importance of appetites that are occasioned by cues but does avoid the empirical and theoretical problems of two-factor theory -... 

There remains the question of how nature can inflict pain on an organism that can control its own reinforcement. Modern operant theory has corrected many of the awkward features of older, two-factor theories of punishment (Hermstein 1969) it portrays pain as simple non-reward, to which an organism attends because it contains adaptive information. However, pain cannot be just the absence of reward or. in terms of the model just presented, the absence of effective rationing devices for self-reward. The person in pain is not just bored, as he would be in a stimulus deprivation situation, but feels attacked by a process that prevents him from enjoying food, entertainment or whatever other sources of reward may be available. And yet the person must perform a motivated act, the direction of his attention to the pain, in order for it to have its effect. As we have seen, pain can be and sometimes is deliberately shut out of consciousness. How does nature get people to open their gates to pain ... 

CBT treatments for PTSD have been widely researched and experimentally validated (Foa et al. 1991 Follete et al. 1999 Horowitz 1986 Keane 1997 Kulka et al. 1990 Resick and Schnicke 1992 Resick et al 1981). Behavioural approaches emphasize the central role of anxious arousal and phobic avoidance in the PTSD syndrome. For example, the two-factor theory (Kilpatrick et al 1982) proposed that anxiety is conditioned to previously neutral cues at the time of the traumatic event. These cues then serve as subsequent triggers to the post-traumatic stress reaction. Avoidance develops in response to the anxiety and is reinforced by reduction in arousal associated with the avoidance. 

Can the following theory motivate members of the companies to share their safety knowledge by IT Theory X Theory Y Reinforcement theory (+) Reinforcement theory (—) Hierarchy of needs Two- factor theory... 

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