Positive reinforcement works better for helping people quit :(
Especially when quitting smoking tanks a person’s dopamine levels. It takes weeks for the body to re-regulate production.
To anyone reading this who has quit/is quitting: congratulations! It’s tough, you have shown a force of willpower and should be proud of yourself.
Love, a fellow Canadian.
Edit:
As with other forms of punishment, aversive methods are generally less effective than positive approaches. It is more important to reward and praise desirable behaviors than to react negatively to unwanted ones. Encouraging a person’s ability to enjoy self-affirmation and self-pride will help them internalize healthy attributes and to become a person deserving of admiration…Shame doesn’t motivate prosocial behaviors; it fuels social withdrawal and low self-esteem.
I’m not trying to convince someone to quit; that’s up to them to derive enough motivation to do so on their own.
I’m just pointing out that their disgusting habit affects everyone around them, if it’s not killing them through second-hand smoke.
I say this as someone who used to smoke 1–2 packs a day, and WISH that someone told me that I smelled as bad as I did. To me, smoking was never about impacting other people, so having known that, I would have at least been more mindful.
That’s not quite what positive reinforcement is but im not sciency enough to understand it either lol
I’ll paste Wikipedias explanation:
In the behavioral sciences, the terms “positive” and “negative” refer when used in their strict technical sense to the nature of the action performed by the conditioner rather than to the responding operant’s evaluation of that action and its consequence(s). “Positive” actions are those that add a factor, be it pleasant or unpleasant, to the environment, whereas “negative” actions are those that remove or withhold from the environment a factor of either type. In turn, the strict sense of “reinforcement” refers only to reward-based conditioning; the introduction of unpleasant factors and the removal or withholding of pleasant factors are instead referred to as “punishment”, which when used in its strict sense thus stands in contradistinction to “reinforcement”. Thus, “positive reinforcement” refers to the addition of a pleasant factor, “positive punishment” refers to the addition of an unpleasant factor, “negative reinforcement” refers to the removal or withholding of an unpleasant factor, and “negative punishment” refers to the removal or withholding of a pleasant factor.
This usage is at odds with some non-technical usages of the four term combinations, especially in the case of the term “negative reinforcement”, which is often used to denote what technical parlance would describe as “positive punishment” in that the non-technical usage interprets “reinforcement” as subsuming both reward and punishment and “negative” as referring to the responding operant’s evaluation of the factor being introduced. By contrast, technical parlance would use the term “negative reinforcement” to describe encouragement of a given behavior by creating a scenario in which an unpleasant factor is or will be present but engaging in the behavior results in either escaping from that factor or preventing its occurrence, as in Martin Seligman’s experiment involving dogs learning to avoid electric shocks.
(These paragraphs are one after the other but I can’t figure out proper formatting)
Just looked into this, and yeah, you’re right. TIL. It’s pretty counterintuitive imo and I don’t think being told it’s wrong from a “how words work sense” is helping anyone, but you are correct and I was incorrect.
I got a coffee from Dunkin Donuts once that had been prepared by someone who had some kind of topical menthol cream all over their hands. That was the second most disgusting thing I’ve put in my mouth.
I was born with a deviated septum, so I can’t smell much of anything, but cigarette is one thing I can smell… And I can confirm everything in your post.
My dad used to smoke. A lot. I once had to borrow his car for a week or so and couldn’t even drive it without flooding it with febreze and opening all the windows.
I used to have a co-worker who smoked so much that I (and others with more sensitive schnozzes) could tell if he’d been in a room in the past hour or more.
Even if you don’t care about your own health, you shouldn’t smoke for the sake of those around you.
Even more pleasant was being driven around in a car with dad smoking in the front seat while you’re behind him. Getting all that wind, smoke and ash in your face. Mmm. Or if it’s too cold he doesn’t wanna open the window really and basically just hotboxes me and my two brothers with nicotine. (This was 25+ years ago)
My eldest brother had asthma, so my parents were generally careful not to smoke around us. They had a dedicated room in the house for smoking so that the rest of the house would get less contaminated. Fortunately, this meant that they didn’t generally smoke in the car while driving us around. Also, my dad worked and/or commuted thirteen hours a day so I was mostly around my mom, who smoked a lot less.
The car borrowing I mentioned was years after my brother had moved across the country when my dad drove his car almost exclusively alone, so at least no one else (who wasn’t borrowing the car) was engulfed.
Reminder to anyone who still smokes: you smell like shit 100% to anyone you interact with.
And any place you still smoke in, whether your car or home, also smells like shit.
And to delivery drivers who smoke, the packages you deliver smell like shit, too!
Positive reinforcement works better for helping people quit :(
Especially when quitting smoking tanks a person’s dopamine levels. It takes weeks for the body to re-regulate production.
To anyone reading this who has quit/is quitting: congratulations! It’s tough, you have shown a force of willpower and should be proud of yourself.
Love, a fellow Canadian.
Edit:
Source: took some psych courses
&
https://www.psychologytoday.com/us/blog/longing-nostalgia/201705/why-shaming-doesnt-work
I’m not trying to convince someone to quit; that’s up to them to derive enough motivation to do so on their own.
I’m just pointing out that their disgusting habit affects everyone around them, if it’s not killing them through second-hand smoke.
I say this as someone who used to smoke 1–2 packs a day, and WISH that someone told me that I smelled as bad as I did. To me, smoking was never about impacting other people, so having known that, I would have at least been more mindful.
Positive reinforcement tends to work best, but people should never underestimate the power of “you smell like an old leather ashtray”
Positive reinforcement is the act of adding either a reward for good behavour or a punishment for bad behavior.
It seems like both of you are doing that.
That’s not quite what positive reinforcement is but im not sciency enough to understand it either lol
I’ll paste Wikipedias explanation:
(These paragraphs are one after the other but I can’t figure out proper formatting)
If you mean formatting as one quote, you are missing the
>on the empty line.> Line 1 > > Line 2Will show as:
Interesting. I’ve never made that distinction between reinforcement and punishment.
Positive punishment is different from positive reinforcement. Shame is a punishment
Adding a shame or punishment is “positive” in the sense of the words positive and negative reinforcement.
Positive is adding to as a response:
Negative is removing from as a response
Punishment for bad behaviour is negative reinforcement.
In a non-technical sense, yes.
In a clinical/technical/literal/how words work sense, no.
Just looked into this, and yeah, you’re right. TIL. It’s pretty counterintuitive imo and I don’t think being told it’s wrong from a “how words work sense” is helping anyone, but you are correct and I was incorrect.
It’s so nasty when you get delivery and the food reeks of cigarettes.
One time it smelled of coppertone sunscreen which was wild and also off putting but in very different ways.
I got a coffee from Dunkin Donuts once that had been prepared by someone who had some kind of topical menthol cream all over their hands. That was the second most disgusting thing I’ve put in my mouth.
I was born with a deviated septum, so I can’t smell much of anything, but cigarette is one thing I can smell… And I can confirm everything in your post.
My dad used to smoke. A lot. I once had to borrow his car for a week or so and couldn’t even drive it without flooding it with febreze and opening all the windows.
I used to have a co-worker who smoked so much that I (and others with more sensitive schnozzes) could tell if he’d been in a room in the past hour or more.
Even if you don’t care about your own health, you shouldn’t smoke for the sake of those around you.
Even more pleasant was being driven around in a car with dad smoking in the front seat while you’re behind him. Getting all that wind, smoke and ash in your face. Mmm. Or if it’s too cold he doesn’t wanna open the window really and basically just hotboxes me and my two brothers with nicotine. (This was 25+ years ago)
My eldest brother had asthma, so my parents were generally careful not to smoke around us. They had a dedicated room in the house for smoking so that the rest of the house would get less contaminated. Fortunately, this meant that they didn’t generally smoke in the car while driving us around. Also, my dad worked and/or commuted thirteen hours a day so I was mostly around my mom, who smoked a lot less.
The car borrowing I mentioned was years after my brother had moved across the country when my dad drove his car almost exclusively alone, so at least no one else (who wasn’t borrowing the car) was engulfed.
I’m sorry you had to suffer through that.
I agree but it is kinda nice being able to smell how stressed my boss is