EATING AT HOME TO SAVE MONEY

Psychology 671Courtney June

Dr. Malott8.11.11

Problem

I was eating food from restaurants several times a week and spending too much money.

Competing Contingencies

Will not have to cook Will not have to clean dishes Easier More time to

study socialize sleep

Natural Competing Contingency

Have N+1hours to

study

Have N hours to

study

Eat a mealat a

restaurant

BEFORE AFTERBEHAVIOR

The SM Intervention

Target behavior: Eating at a Restaurant

Intervention: Lose $2 for meals eaten out

after already having eaten out that week Contingencies: analog to a penalty

contingency

Deadline (SD): n/a

PM manager: Lori June

Start Date: June 13, 2011

End Date: August 11, 2011

Ineffective Natural Contingency

Have infinitesimally

less money

Have given amount

of money

Eat one mealat a

restaurant

BEFORE AFTERBEHAVIOR

The outcome was too small to control my behavior, though eating out many times has a cumulative significance on a bank account

Performance-Management Contingency

Will lose$2 on

Monday

Won’t lose$2 on

Monday

Eat one mealat a

restaurant

BEFORE AFTERBEHAVIOR

Does notfear losing

$2

Eat a mealat a

restaurant

Does fearLosing

$2

Direct Acting Contingency

1 2 3 4 5 6 7 80

1

2

3

4

5

Cum

. B

ehavio

r:

Meals

I E

at

from

a

Rest

aura

nt

Weeks at a Glance

Weeks

Baseline

Starting Date:June 13, 2011

SM Recycle

Goal Line

Target Behavior GraphC

um

. B

ehavio

r M

eals

I

Eat

at

Hom

e

1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 90

2

4

6

8

10

12

14

Weeks at a Glance

WeeksStarting Date: June 13, 2011

Baseline RecycleSM Goal

line

Benefit Measure Graph

0

1

2

3

4

1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9

Baseline SM

Weeks

Cu

m. B

ehavio

r of

Eati

ng

M

eals

fro

m a

Rest

au

rant

Problems During Intervention

Not always enough time to go grocery shopping

Ineffective contingency $2 penalty was not large enough

Recycle

The $2 penalty contingency

was ineffective

Increased penalty to match

the cost of the meal If meal was $6, penalty was to pay

performance manager $6(Including

performance

management)

My Results

I found the recycle phase to be more effective

Paying my performance manager the amount that matches the price of the meal was more aversive than the simple $2

My Comments

Between you and me, I will not continue this project any longer.

It was nice being able to save money by limiting myself to one restaurant-meal a week.

BUT, it was so annoying. Especially when I would not finish

homework until later in the evening and was too tired to cook.

THANK YOU!!

Any Questions or

Comments?