Program Evaluation

After 8 weeks of dedicating myself to this blog and to the improvement in my behavior, I can say that my behavior has indeed changed. Although not as drastic as I expected it to be, which is the main target of 30 mins of continuous exercise every weekday, I have been initiating in exercising 30 mins of continuous exercise a day 3 days a week, at least every other week. Whenever I have a hectic and busy schedule, I resolve to stretching instead. These things are great improvements for me if we consider my baseline behavior which is exercsing an hour a day in a dance class that I am required to take.

Parts of the Program that Worked:
Giving myself positive reinforcements really helped in encouraging me to exercise during the week. But after the week is over, they seem to negatively affect my exercising. I become complacent and tend to slacken off the next week after I give myself the reinforcements.

The program changes that I implemented also benefited me in this whole process.
Negative Punishment genuinely helped me with my exercising. During the days that I did not follow through on my plan the negative punishment such as, replacing coffee with tea and not listening to my favorite band bugged me soooooooo much that I felt compelled to exercising again the following week. Claiming working days and stretching as half-exercise is for me not considered cheating, but it is compromising for my busy schedules. There are really some times when school comes first before anything else, and I am to prioritize some things, this seems only fair.

Parts of the Program that did not work:
The positive punishment that I implemented did not help at all. Firstly, whenever I did chores as a punishment, it kinda annoyed me but all in all I liked it that I did chores so that I can help around the house. Doubling the amount of exercise is not that appropriate especially if I can't commit to doing my regular exercise in the first place. I would think that increasing the amount of exercise should be done if I am fully committed to doing the regular amount first and I am really finding it easy. I think one thing that did not make this effective is that I was the one who was giving punishments to myself. I guess next time I should involve another person so that I would make sure that the punishments would be implemented properly.

Heightened awareness to my behavior had a big influence on my efforts to maintain my behavior but it wasn't fully responsible. The rewards and punishments of operant conditioning also greatly affected my behavior. Anticipating for the rewards made me want to fulfill my goals for at least the week. Big rewards made me want to strive to maintain it for a long time (especially Disneyland). Punishments, even the little ones like not listening to my band or not having coffee, kept me focused on my goal because they really agitated me.

In all honesty, the only thing that would make any behavioral changes long term is discipline. No matter how many rewards or punishments influence my behavior, the decision to do something will always be up to the person at the end. If I am really concerned about my well being it will be enough to maintain a regular healthy exercise routine everyday.

The hardest part of this assignment is managing my schedule so that I can find time to do my behavior regularly. With a busy college life, studying and working, it is challenging to find time. Another hard thing about this assignment is implementing rewards and punishments that are suitable for my behavior and may have just the right effect.

The most valuable part of this assignment is being able to follow through on your program. The feeling of accomplishing something challenging is always fulfilling. This feeling inspires me to do my best at whatever I do. In truth, whenever someone gives their all in attaining their goals and dreams, whether big or small, they always get rewarded. The harder the journey, the better the reward. And this is ALL the TIME! :)

This assignment just confirmed my notions about operant conditioning. It made me realize that I already have been doing this in my life. Whenever I do well on something, I do give myself a reward. Whenever I don't do that well on something, I give myself a few restrictions but not as severe as what I have been giving myself in this program. I come to the conclusion that operant conditioning is very powerful, in pointing towards the right direction of your behavior. But in truth, personal willpower is even more powerful. :)

I want to thank everyone for their comments and suggestions throught this whole process, it has been fun reading your comments. ;) I am gonna miss everyone. Hope you guys have a great holiday season. :)

Progress Week 3

Target Behavior: (Shoot me Now!)

Wednesday: School work the WHOLE DAY! Human trafficking conference paper and speech, field experiment. I was not able to exercise at all.
Thursday: School work again this time reading 150 pages of George Orwell for English class and NOT HAVING A TEST! grrr....hahaha! Again, I was not able to exercise.
Friday: Finishing touches on field experiment and speech. Spent some time with my boyfriend and not being able to exercise again!
Saturday: Attended Human Trafficking conference which was relieving and fun. Worked in the Mt. Sac Theater all night (missed the Manny Pacquiao Boxing match) I count this as half- exercise, but I will explain in detail why later.
Sunday: Worked 8 full hours without prior notice. ( I was greatful but a little stressed out haha). I count this as full exercise.
Monday: I stretched for a few mins. (15 mins - Thanks Christin) I was ready to go running with my boyfriend and his sister but his sister got sick and so we decided not to run anymore. ( I watched a recording of the Pacquiao fight instead) I also count this as half-exercise.
Tuesday: I have been studying the whole day for the Psych exam tomorrow and I stretched for 10 mins. I consider this as Half-Exercise.

Comments:
Taking everything into consideration I exercised for 2 and a half days this week. As anyone can plainly see, I was really busy this week. I do not regret relaxing instead of exercising because I was physically and mentally exhausted the whole week, I needed the breaks really. I punished myself this week by replacing juice with water and lattes with brewed coffee or tea. I also did some chores that I did NOT like doing (dusting the gross window blinds.. eeew...) I did not, however, punish myself severely because I do not think I deserved it since I was really drained this week. But at least I did punish myself somehow. I did not really reinforce myself this much because the exercise that I did was not how I planned it to be executed. To be fair, no reinforcement was given and, to recap, only slight punishment was given.

Effects of Punishment: The punishment was just right. It annoyed me and made me wish I could exercise "properly" because I really wanted to. I will try to do so the following week but I will not be too hard on myself if I don't.

Program Changes:
Ok so you guys may all be wondering I classified stretching and working half day as "half-exercise" and working all day as "full-exercise". Well, I took may of your comments into consideration and you guys are right! As Cristin said, school is more important and I do not want to stress myself out even more by putting myself down whenever I can't continuously exercise especially now that school is about to end and that there are so many things that need to be done. Working in my job is exercising indeed! I sweep, mop, stand on my feet the whole day and constantly move about! Whether or not I like it, it is exercising. Stretching is a great form of exercise because it allows you to move more freely whenever you do it and it relieves your muscles from cramps and pains.

Your comments have been making me feel better. Now I know that I am not as lazy as I think I am. I know that regular continuous exercise is important but I also know that doing my daily activities is also considered as exercise if you look at it from another perspective. Thanks guys!

Progress Week 2

Target Behavior:

Wednesday - 2 hour dance class. I was so tired! (reinforcement: another carrot juice)
Thursday - worked and went to class (did not have time to exercise)
Friday - Jogged for 45 mins (went beyond target time) (reinforcement: Coffee Bean Ice Blended)
Saturday - worked two jobs (did not have time to exercise)
Sunday - spent the day doing the field experiment (did not have time to exercise)
Monday - went jogging for 30 mins (right time)(reinforcement: protein bar)(indirect punishment:buying all healthy snacks as opposed to buying snacks that are high in fat)
Tuesday - doing schoolwork (will not have time to exercise)

Comments: My behavior is changing! Despite the troubles due to adjustment on the first week, I have managed to dedicate some time to changing my behavior. I did not punish myself fully this week because I managed to stick to my target behavior. I did sort of punish myself indirectly by buying healthy snacks instead of "full flavor" snacks (eg. baked chips, and protein bars). I gave myself a weekly long term reinforcement - bought an exercising outfit and a jump rope. This reinforcement seems like a punishment but it actually isn't since I have been wanting to buy these things to ensure my dedication to my behavior change.

Effects of Reinforcement: The long term and short term positive reinforcements are really helping now. They make me feel accomplished everytime I stick to my word.

Effects of Punishment: The punishment is also helping me in a good way. By buying healthier snacks, I am watching out for myself. This is also helping in producing better physical changes that accompany my target behavior.

Program Changes: Now that everything seems to be working, I don't wanna just give up that easily and slack off for the rest of this process. From now on I will target in exercising either 4 days a week instead of 3 or 45 mins everyday for 3 days instead of 30 mins. By doing this I am challenging myself in order to get better results. If I accomplish my ORIGINAL target behavior (3 days a week, 30 mins each day) I will give myself a short term reinforcement only as opposed to a long term one. And I will give myself a little negative or positive punishment but nothing too severe (eg. replacing coffee with tea, juice instead of ice blended shakes etc.) because I still did follow through on my original plan. However, if I do not follow through, I will give myself a stern punishment.

To all of you: Thank you so much for your comments! They are genuinely helping me. ;)

Progress Week 1

Target Behavior:

Wednesday - Dance class 2 hours - (reinforcement: carrot juice)
Thursday - Worked from 11am-5pm - I was so tired that I did not exercise anymore.
Friday - Worked from 1O:30am-6:30am - I had a halloween party to attend so again I did not exercise
Saturday - I came home at 3am from the previous night and I woke up late and again worked from 1pm-closing then I had another party to attend so again I did not exercise.
Sunday - I woke up late again and then did my homework so again I did not exercise (punishment: dusted the whole of the family livingroom)
Monday - I had both school and work so again I did not exercise
Tuesday - I was on call for work and I have school later on so I did not exercise. (cleaned restrooms downstairs)

Effect of reinforcement: In all honesty the reinforcement helped me become motivated to exercise again. It's only that I recently was just hired for a job and luckily, I have been getting 8 hours a day most of the time. I think my body has to get accustomed to this new schedule that is going on in my life. Aside from that there have been many people who were wanting my company this week for parties and invitations. I fully accepted them since I have not seen these people in a very long time. Hopefully I can officially get started next week.

Effect of Punishment: The punishment is motivating me as well but at the same time I am happy doing it. I like helping around the house and it is about time that I did. I guess the punishment, although I do NOT like it in a way that it is really a bother doing chores, is not that much of a punishment anymore. As for the other kind of punishment, I do not think I can double the amount of exercise that I am supposed to do if I my body is not physically capable of doing the target exercise in the first place. (Steve is right its hard!)

I think that it will just take a few more days for me to be accustomed to my current schedule. It is still all a good surprise to me, all the events that happened this week. I am still lost in amazement... haha. I will try my best to motivate myself to exercise for the better. The reason why I want to do it is because it is reasonably for my own good.

Program changes:
- A good change to the program might be to add negative punishment (taking away something that is wanted). Short term: replacing my daily doze of coffee with mild tea, not drinking iced brisk raspberry tea at work, giving myself only one serving of carbohydrates in a day, not listening to my favorite band. By doing this we can take away some of the commonly experienced privileges that a person has, making for the person want to have them again since they are "normally" apart of the person's life. I learned that negative punishment is commonly used for training dogs (www.uspcak9.com/training/negative_punishment.pdf). I do view this behavior change task as sort of training myself to act wisely for my own good.

Implementing Operant Conditioning on My Behavior

There are many ways in which I can use operant conditioning to strengthen my behavior of exercising regularly. In my opinion this method will be helpful in motivating me to strive for the best because of the consequences that may occur whether it may be of good or bad nature.

PROGRAM ON OPERANT CONDITIONING

Types of Reinforcement/ Punishment to be used:
a. Positive Reinforcements - to give something that a person wants.

• A reward, after a strenuous activity or something that is physically demanding, makes the person who is trying to change their behavior feel satisfied about the amount of work that he/she puts into their efforts. They feel proud of themselves because of the "prizes" that they receive, seeing that their actions are worth a lot more than expected and are worthwhile as well.
  
• Short term - These should be given on either a daily or weekly basis whenever the person completes the preferred method of doing the target behavior within the intended frequency.
  E.g. healthy treat (yoghurt, Jamba Juice), Dedicating a day for fun leisure activities within the week or watching a movie in the theater.

• Long term - If the person succeeds in doing the preferred method of their behavior consistently for a long period of time, such as a month or two months, then that person is worthy of a greater reward for the dedication that they put into the change that they want.
  Eg. A new pair of jeans in a smaller size, a trip to Hollywood/Disneyland, a new book for leisure reading or a dinner treat to a restaurants

b. Positive Punishment - to give something that a person does NOT want.

• An unwanted responsibility is unpleasant but in order to see the consequences of their irregular behavior pattern this can be helpful. This will motivate the person to do it right and hopefully avoid the punishments that will be given if they step out of line.
• Short Term - These should be given on either a daily or weekly basis if the person fails to completes the preferred method of doing the target behavior within the intended frequency.
  E.g. Double the amount of exercise/repetitions, double the time or hours of exercising, giving myself weekly chores that I am not supposedly responsible for.
  
• Long Term - If the person does not succeed in doing the preferred method of their behavior consistently for a long period of time, such as a month or two months, then that person is worthy of a greater punishment for the indifference that they put into the change that they want.
  E.g. Treating my parents out to dinner or giving my dad extra cash.

Hopefully this method will be useful in helping my behavior change. Let's see after a week. :)

Basline Behavior, Operant Conditioning and Research

Hello all!

As you all know by now, my target behavior is exercising, and as expected my behavior last week was horrible. At baseline, I was only able to exercise once last week and that is only because it was required. I exercised last Wednesday for my dance class. I spent approximately 1 hour exercising that day. I did some stretching, sit-ups, push ups and dancing which is equivalent to my cardiovascular activity. My dance class was supposed to go on for 2 hours but we had our midterm test. Because of this, my exercising was very staggered. When I did get to dance I gave full energy to it though so as to get a good grade. I was out of breath after the whole test, this showed that my body is not catching to the intensity of our dance.

I personally think I have a love-hate relationship with exercising. I love it because I receive short-term benefits from not doing it often. My body does not get sore the next day when I don't exercise the day before. I have more time to do leisure activities such as playing Farmville on Facebook, watching movies or playing my guitar/singing. I get more time to sleep when I don't exercise, since I usually exercise in the morning sun. When I do not exercise, however, I am less productive, I lose my breath easily (as seen during my midterm), and this even affects my singing because I can't extend a note as far as I usually can. But honestly, I believe that getting sore is way better than losing my breath all the time and not being physically capable of doing certain things.

Now that I have laid out my whole hate relationship with exercising, I want to strengthen my LOVE relationship with it. In order to do that, I will first discuss the main benefits of exercising. Knowing why it is beneficial to health is key to being motivated on doing it. Naturally, anyone would prioritize important things. Mayo Clinic, a not-for-profit medical practice company, posted an article entitled Exercise: 7 benefits of regular physical activity, presenting the benefits of exercise. The main points are shown below, for a full version visit the link. (Link - http://www.mayoclinic.com/health/exercise/HQ01676)

1. Exercise improves your mood. Physical activity stimulates various brain chemicals that may leave you feWhen your heart and lungs work more efficiently, you'll have more energy to do the things you enjoy. eling happier and more relaxed than you were before you worked out. (Mayo clinic staff, 2009, p.1)

2. Exercise combats chronic diseases. Examples are diabetes, osteoporosis, and certain types of cancer. (Mayo clinic staff, 2009, p.1)

3. Exercise helps you manage your weight. The more intense the activity, the more calories you burn — and the easier it is to keep your weight under control. (Mayo clinic staff, 2009, p.1)

4. Exercise boosts your energy level. Physical activity delivers oxygen and nutrients to your tissues.When your heart and lungs work more efficiently, you'll have more energy to do the things you enjoy. (Mayo clinic staff, 2009, p.2)

5. Exercise promotes better sleep. Regular physical activity can help you fall asleep faster and deepen your sleep. (Mayo clinic staff, 2009, p.2)

6. Exercise can put the spark back into your sex life. (Mayo clinic staff, 2009, p.2)

7. Exercise can be fun. (Mayo clinic staff, 2009, p.2)

Clearly, the benefits of exercise are not only seen in a physical perspective but also in a deeper personal perspective to promote general well-being. Another important thing to consider so as to make long-term changes to my target behavior is, "How often should I ideally engage in regular physical activity?". Fitness expert Greg Shealy answers this question. First, he says that most experts recommend 20 mins of exercise at least 3 times a week. As soon as this routine is set, he then stresses the importance of increasing the following: frequency, duration, intensity and progression. Increasing these factors gradually will help one reap the full benefits of exercising. (Shealy, 2009, p.1)

WORKS CITED

Mayo Clinic Staff. (2009). Exercise: 7 benefits of regular physical activity. Mayo Clinic. Retrieved October 20, 2009, from the World Wide Web: http://www.mayoclinic.com/health/exercise/HQ01676.

Shealy, Greg. (2009). How Often to Work Out. Discovery Health: Diet and Fitness Center. Retrieved October 20, 2009, form the World Wide Web: http://health.discovery.com/centers/diet-fitness/diet-fitness-qa/working-out.html.

Target Behavior and Rationale

Before I decided upon my target behavior, I had chanced upon Chapter 10 of our class textbook, Psychology Concepts and Applications 3rd Edition. This chapter focuses on Adolescence and Adulthood. In section 10.4 the importance and benefits of exercise were highlighted. It is said in the textbook, "Exercise at any age is healthful, but especially as we age. Mounting evidence points to the role of physical exercise in slowing the effects of aging such as loss of lean body mass, bone density, and muscle strength." (Adler and Raymond, 2001; O'Neil, 2003) Just after reading this, the light bulb lit up in my head, "eureka!" I have finally found my target behavior: dedicating myself to exercising regularly.

Before I started going to school and becoming extra, extra busy, I already did this. I used to go to the gym or run and workout at home EVERYDAY. I lost so much weight and I felt good about myself. I was able to accomplish more within the day because of the energy that I had, helping me to take on one challenge at a time. I am not saying that I do not accomplish much anymore but I noticed that I am more lazy now that I do not exercise, considering that I don't have a job right now either. I want to be more productive during the "younger years" of my life. I want to grow old gracefully and healthily and I want to live a long long life! I want to have the physical strength to accomplish everything that I have dreamed of till the last day I breathe! These are the reasons why I choose exercising as my desired target behavior.

I would want to increase the amount of exercise that I do on a weekly basis. Currently I am only exercising once a week or even not at all. To effectively receive healthy benefits from exercising, I would want to exercise at least 3 or more times a week. Eventually, it would be best for me to exercise every week day. As an added bonus, another behavior that would be linked to this is time management. By setting an allotted schedule for my work out time, I will hopefully be able to effectively manage my whole day as well.

Please help me focus on this classmates! I would really appreciate all of your help. I promise to do the same for all of you. I already did it before and that's why I know I can do it again! (*Putting on a war mask) :D