experiment

Well, I am not sure if this counts or not but I am pretty sure that what I have done is in a way a form of operant conditioning.

 

The cat in my house likes to go "exploring" a lot. My door is usually shut, although everytime I leave it open it seems as if the cat has a sensor that goes off which leads it to my open door into my room. I don't like this. At first I would simply pick up the cat and walk it outside my door and gently drop it. I believe since there was no real negative consequence to the cat entering my room, this lead to the other dozens of times in which the cat entered my room. I have recently changed my tactics though. Now instead of picking up the cat and getting clawed at in the process, I simply whip it with my key chain. After the first few good connections on my cat, I have noticed an immediate change in its behavior. Now instead of it running and hiding in my room, it simply gazes up at me in fear and sprints out of my room and hides. It gets even better though. As I am not a big fan of the cats, also I don't like when it is near me so now even outside my room when I see it it runs in fear of me. The fear of a little pain completely changes the way my cat is around me, which is benefitial to me in every way as no more cat in room, and no more cat getting in way.

 

 

Brendan McKeown