Sniffy and Basic Operant Phenomena
Carmen Fowler
Northwestern State University

My experience with Sniffy was difficult at times, but very informative. I’ve learned a great deal about Classical conditioning, in the first experiment with Sniffy, and Operant Conditioning in this one. The experiment with Operant Conditioning took much more time than the previous experiment. The total time it took for me to complete the five exercises in this experiment was about four hours. The exercises included magazine training, shaping Sniffy to press the bar, extinction, secondary reinforcement, and spontaneous recovery. Magazine training and shaping Sniffy to press the bar took up the greatest amount of time, 2 hours and 10 minutes for the first and 1 hour and 15 minutes for the latter. The other exercises took very little time because I completed them in accelerated time.
One of the things that I found to be very interesting is the concept of magazine training. Magazine Training is a technique used to create an association between the sound of the food pellet falling into the hopper and the reinforcement of the food. By doing this, Sniffy will learn to press the bar on his own much more quickly than without magazine training. This exercise was very interesting, but it was also very frustrating to me because it took the longest time to complete. Another thing that I found interesting was shaping Sniffy to press the bar. I felt a rush of excitement when he started pressing the bar on his own. It is important to remember that a person does not teach Sniffy or any other animal for that matter to press the bar, but only reinforces his ability to do so. It is amazing how operant conditioning works.
I enjoyed working with Sniffy, for the most part. There were some frustrations that I had such as in magazine training when Sniffy wouldn’t find the pellet quickly enough after