MANAGERIAL AND DECISION ECONOMICS

Manage. Decis. Econ. (2015)

Published online in Wiley Online Library

(wileyonlinelibrary.com) DOI: 10.1002/mde.2712

Operant Behavioral Economics

Gordon R. Foxall*
Cardiff Business School, Cardiff University, Cardiff, Wales, UK

The aims of this special issue are to introduce managerial economists to a school of behavioral economics they may not yet have encountered by way of accounts by leading researchers of its basic tenets, methods, and applications. This overview introduces the
papers by setting them in the context of the development of operant behavioral economics.
Copyright 2015 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.

It is pleasing when disciplines, whose initial development trajectories are as diverse as those of operant
psychology and microeconomics, demonstrate an
afnity that promotes both their interaction and their
mutual benet. The potential became obvious when
behavioral psychologists began to consider and
compare the ways in which micro-economists and
behavioral psychologists study behavior (Hursh,
1978, 1980, 1984; Lea, 1978). Around the same
time, some economists were seeking an experimental
analysis of their subject matter (e.g., Castro and
Weingarten, 1970; Smith, 1982). The contingencies,
likely to bring about a productive collaboration, were
being assembled. This does not mean that the interaction is seamless or without controversy who would
want that? but that two intellectual communities are
able to learn from one another and to grow as a
result.
The resulting research program, operant behavioral
economics, contributes positively to the objectives of
both disciplines by bringing theoretical perspectives
and novel methodologies to bear on each of its
constituents. With some simplication, while microeconomics permits the conceptualization of behavior
as the allocation of scarce resources among competing
ends, operant psychology (or behavior analysis, as it is
*Correspondence to: Cardiff Business School, Cardiff University,
Cardiff, Wales, UK. E-mail: foxall@cardiff.ac.uk

Copyright 2015 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.

more usually known) conceives behavior in terms of

the allocation of a number of responses that the
individual can emit among alternative reinforcing outcomes (Staddon, 1980; Kagel et al., 1995; Foxall and
Sigurdsson, 2013). The term operant denotes behaviors that operate on the environment to generate consequences, which are followed by changes in the rate at
which the behaviors are performed: those consequences that are followed by an increase in response
rate are known as reinforcers and those followed by
a reduction in rate, as punishers (Skinner, 1953). The
three-term contingency, which provides the basic
explanatory device of operant behaviorism, takes the
form SD R Sr , where a discriminative stimulus, SD, is an element of the environment in the
presence of which a response, R, has been rewarded
by the appearance of another environmental element,
Sr, which because of its strengthening effect on the
behavior is known as a reinforcer. When the occurrence of a response can be accurately predicted from
the appearance of the discriminative stimulus, it is said
to be under stimulus control, and this will be
maintained as long as the response is followed from
time to time by the reinforcer. (For greater detail on
the subtleties of operant psychology and its philosophical implications for the explanation of behavior, see
inter alia Baum, 2006; Moore, 2008; Rachlin, 2014.)
The opportunity for collaboration is clear from the
conceptual harmonies shown by the two disciplines:

G. R. FOXALL

The central components of microeconomic

analysis nd analogues in the operant analysis
of choice: economic commodities correspond
to reinforcers (they are both classes of things
whose contingent presentation will maintain
behavior; Lea, 1978, p. 443); price corresponds to a schedule parameter, since both indicate how much of a limited exchange
resource must be given up in order to obtain
the reinforcer; and money is equivalent to the
number of responses upon which delivery of
the reinforcer is contingent. Thus the economists demand curve, which relates the quantity of a good which is bought to price, is
analogous to a function relating the quantity
of reinforcements obtained and the number of
responses required to obtain them (Foxall,
1990/2004, p. 83).
As the papers in this special issue demonstrate, operant behavioral economics represents more than the
simple application of microeconomics to behavioral
psychology. Behavioral economists have developed
and applied economic analysis, broadened the range
of human activities to which economics is applied,
brought the rigor of experimental analysis to bear
where appropriate, and developed novel methodological tools for both economics and psychology. At the
same time, operant behavioral economics has come
to provide a standpoint from which the assumptions
of neoclassical microeconomics can be subjected to
criticism and, if necessary, adjusted. Most of the papers contribute both to the conceptualization of operant behavioral economics and to either its empirical,
methodological, and practical implications or the extension of its eld of application. Despite these overlaps, they can be broadly classied from an editorial
point of view into three groups. First are those papers
(by Hursh & Roma; Baum; Rachlin; and Ainslie) that
make important conceptual and substantive contributions to the foundations of operant behavioral economics. Second are those (by Jarmolowicz, Reed,
DiGennaro Reed and Bickel; Hantula; Roma, Hursh,
and Hudja; Fagerstrom, Aksnes, and Arntzen; and
Fagerstrom, Ghinea, and Sydnes) that are principally
concerned with applications and extensions: to both
managerial concerns and to methodological sophistication. Third come those (by Sigurdsson, Hinriksson,
and Menon; Menon and Sigurdsson; and OliveiraCastro, Cavalcanti, and Foxall) that are concerned
with consumer behavior analysis, which combines operant behavioral economics with marketing science
Copyright 2015 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.

(Foxall, 2001, 2002). I should like to introduce each

of these categories with some brief considerations,
which may be especially useful to managerial economists encountering operant behavioral economics for
the rst time.

FOUNDATIONS
Background
Behavioral economics in this tradition has extended its
reach beyond conventional realms of economic behavior such as labor and consumption, to enhance the
analysis of animal behavior and welfare, anti-social
responding, addiction and health, marketing and organizational management, and other applied areas. A
central theme is the matching of relative response rates
to relative rates of reinforcement, which is closely related to the phenomenon of hyperbolic temporal
discounting. Underlying much of this work is the
pioneering contribution of Herrnstein (1961, 1970,
1997) which showed that when, in an experimental situation, an animal is presented with two operanda, A
and B, which might be keys to peck or levers to press,
each of which delivers a reinforcer on its own variable
interval (VI) schedule, the animal matches its relative
response rates to the relative rates of reinforcement actually obtained. A schedule programs the relationship
between reinforcers and responding. An interval
schedule requires that some minimum time must
elapse before a response receives reinforcement. On
a variable interval or VI schedule, the time varies between the delivery of reinforcers. In the case of the
concurrent VI schedules used in matching experiments, the schedules are in operation simultaneously
or concurrently, and independently, providing reinforcement after different durations provided at least
one response has been made since previous reinforcement. See, for example, Catania (1997). Hence, the
basic matching relationship is as follows:
Ra = Ra Rb r a = r a rb

(1)

where Ra is the number of responses on operandum A,

Rb is the number of responses on operandum B, ra is
the number of reinforcements obtained on A, and rb
is the number of reinforcements obtained on B.
Baums (1974, 1979) presentation of the Generalized Matching Law introduced some subtleties to the
analysis of matching phenomena that were invaluable
contributions to the investigation of behavior as economic. As Baum points out in his paper in this issue
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OPERANT BEHAVIORAL ECONOMICS

(Driven by Consequences: The Multiscale Molar

View of Choice), this law takes the form (exemplied
in the context of, say, a pigeon responding by pecking
on two keys):
log

B1
r1
slog logb
B2
r2

(2)

where B1 and B2 are the times expended in pecking

keys 1 and 2, respectively, r1 and r2, the rates of food
delivery as a result of pecking keys 1 and 2, respectively, s is sensitivity to variation in the food ratio
(the schedules of reinforcement), and b indicates bias
resulting from factors other than food rate. The interpretation of s as indicating the degree of substitutability of alternative reinforcers (such as competing
brands that belong to the same product class) has
proved instructive in assessing the substitutability,
complementarity, and independence of products encountered in the market place.
The tendency toward matching exhibited in so
much animal and human behavior has implications
for understanding and studying choice, conceived as
the relative rate of responding on different alternatives; well expressed by de Villiers and Herrnstein,
1976, (p.1131), who say, our position is that choice
is merely behavior in the context of other behavior,
not a distinctive psychological process of its own.
The underlying behavioral mechanism that accounts
for matching, what Herrnstein (1982); Herrnstein and
Prelec (1991) calls melioration, is the selection of the
more protable or less costly of two choices currently
available, leading to the maximization of local or immediate reinforcement (as opposed to global maximization of a series of choices: Herrnstein, 1990). This
tendency has implications for the study of akrasia
(weakness of will) in everyday experience as well as
in its extreme form, substance and process or behavioral addiction. Melioration is the basis of the preference reversals seen in individuals opting at time t1
for the larger of two rewards, even though it is available long after the other, but switching at t2 to the
choice of the smaller reward, which is available sooner
once this becomes temporally closer.
More generally, matching suggests that the value of
a reinforcer is inversely proportional to its delay, that
is, as the delay becomes shorter, the value increases
dramatically. This is the essence of hyperbolic
discounting. Whereas, in exponential discounting,
the larger-later reward (LLR) is always preferable to
the smaller-sooner reward (SSR), regardless of time
elapsed, in hyperbolic discounting, there is a period
during which the SSR is so highly valued (as a
Copyright 2015 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.

function of the time remaining to its possible realization having become so short) that it is preferred to
the LLR (Ainslie, 1992). This is clearly not because
of its objective value, which is by denition less than
that which can be obtained through patience, but because the time remaining to its possible realization is
now so short that it is preferred to the later but larger
reward.
Papers
In Behavioral economics and the analysis of consumption and choice, Steven Hursh and Peter Roma
present the fundamentals of the operant paradigm
and its relevance to the behavioral economics program. In particular, they note points of convergence
between the disciplines that comprise the paradigm
and remark specically on the role of the allocation
of behavioral resources among alternative reinforcers.
They provide a primer for an approach to behavioral
economics that is able to inform both the pure science
of behavior and managerial and policy decisionmaking. The central component of this approach is
the representation of the value consumers attach to
products by the use of an exponential function to capture the non-linearity of demand curves, the exponential model of demand (Hursh and Silberberg, 2008).
Essential value is shown to be a useful means by
which to categorize differences between commodities, differences between individuals toward similar
commodities, and differences in the value of commodities across different contexts of available alternatives
and disincentives, all of which have obvious echoes
in managerial concerns such as the identication of
criteria for market segmentation and innovation. An
interesting development is the capacity of
questionnaire-based methods of investigation to yield
demand curves of this form, which promises to enhance the applicability of behavioral economics to
managerial concerns, a theme that is taken up in a later
paper by Roma, Hursh, and Hadja (Hypothetical purchase task questionnaires for behavioral economic assessments of value and motivation).
Behavior analysis is an intellectually progressive
research program: its theoretical debates and its empirical ndings are stimulating and informative. In Baum
(1973), William Baum argued that the central component of operant psychology is a sequence of responses
that is related correlatively to a sequence of
reinforcers. His seminal work in the derivation of the
Generalized Matching Law was noted previously.
Central to this work is the distinction between a
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G. R. FOXALL

molecular view of operant behavior, which attempts to

relate each individual response to its specic controlling consequences, and the molar view, which emphasizes sequences or patterns of behavior and
reinforcers. Baum has argued forcefully for the latter
(e.g., Baum, 2002; see also Baum, 2012; Baum, 2013).
In his paper in this issue, Driven by consequences:
The Multiscale Molar View of choice, Baum emphasizes that behavior is to be conceptualized as choice,
that temporal limitations mean that alternative behaviors must compete. Whereas the conventional
way of looking at responses and their reinforcing
consequences takes the molecular perspective that
examines each individual response in relation to its
immediate outcomes, the multiscale molar view envisions behavior as a sequence of activities over
time that covaries with a series of consequences,
also temporally extended, that induces or drives the
behavior. Choice may be viewed in this perspective
as the relative allocation of time between alternative
behavior patterns (Baum and Rachlin, 1969). Within
this conceptualization of choice, Baum discusses
matching in terms of substitutability, foraging, as well
as impulsivity and self-control in the context of
temporal discounting.
Howard Rachlin, in his paper, Social cooperation
and self-control, also emphasizes the need to comprehend behavior as a sequence of activities extended in
time. A problem arises in the delineation and measurement of altruism in behavior analytical terms: as
Rachlin and Lacey (2011), (p. 25) put it, The object
of behavior analysis is to identify reinforcers of acts.
But an individual altruistic act apparently has no reinforcer; if it did, it would not be altruistic. Altruism thus
seems to defy behavioral analysis. However, in Social cooperation and self-control, Rachlin demonstrates the usefulness of measuring altruism by
means of social discount functions, just as self-control
has been measured by delay discount functions. The
understanding of behavior as temporally extended
suggests that activities must be considered as patterns
of behavior. Social cooperation and self-control may
be selected as patterns of behavior in a procedure analogous to natural selection in evolutionary biology. By
arguing that such behaviors as social cooperation and
self-control be thought of as sequences of choice over
time, Rachlins analysis goes beyond the basis on
which a great deal of matching research is founded,
namely that of individually considered selections of
the more highly-valued alternative. There are important implications of this reasoning for managerial
decision-making in the contexts of both social policy
Copyright 2015 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.

and the marketing and demarketing of commodities

likely to lead to addiction.
George Ainslies paper (The Cardinal Anomalies
that led to Behavioral Economics: Cognitive or Motivational?) provides a bridge between operant behavioral economics and other schools of behavioral
economic thought, such as that of Kahneman and
Tversky (1984). Ainslie refers to the cognitive school
as that which revealed anomalies in the microeconomics of choice, arising from the phenomena of cognitive
framing that are the subject of Kahneman and
Tverskys Prospect Theory, while the anomalies revealed by the motivational school of operant behavioral economics inhere in the phenomena of
hyperbolic temporal discounting and intertemporal
bargaining, notably analyzed in terms of
picoeconomics (Ainslie, 1992). The integrative potential of Ainslies contribution here is that the foundations of framing effects generally are to be found in
motivational considerations. His paper has implications not only for the conceptual bases of behavioral
economics but for the intertemporal bargaining that
lies at the heart of many of the practical applications
of operant behavioral economics.

APPLICATIONS AND EXTENSIONS

Background
Consideration of intertemporal bargaining is particularly pertinent to the applied aspects of operant behavioral economics such as health and addiction (Rachlin
2000). Ainslie (1992) speaks of the problem of
akrasia or weakness of will by reference to separate
interests that are in conict: one is concerned with
our gaining long-term benet such as engaging in productive work and the other with short-term pleasures
like undemanding amusement. Ones experience as
the locus of this clash of interests is often marked by
a sturdy resolve to undertake the more rewarding activity, followed by a lapse into the other, just as it becomes available, followed by regret, further
resolution, and perhaps inevitable relapse. This cycle
is characteristic of addiction but it also marks many
everyday switches of preference involved in less extreme behavior. What is so preferable when we make
our plans is edged out by an alternative that is initially
unthinkable but of immense value as it hooves into
sight. Even though we know fully well that the activity
that we were determined to undertake when we set out
will bring greater benet, the fact that it is delayed
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OPERANT BEHAVIORAL ECONOMICS

while the less benecial can be obtained immediately

raises the value of the latter sharply till it exceeds the
current worth of the other. An intriguing facet of
Ainslies approach is the possibility that, by bundling together the combined benets of a series of
later-appearing rewards and comparing these in toto
with the immediate benet of a current less valuable
choice, it is possible to overcome the temptation to
make a sub-optimal decision (i.e., to exercise willpower or self-control). Hence, picoeconomics has
implications for the role of cognition and metacognition in relationships between neuro-behavioral decision systems and the place of agency in
understanding their interaction.
Some of these implications are taken up by Ross
(2009), who denes the situation in economic terms
by reference to two rewards (a and b) available at different times such that a is, for example, taking a short
vacation starting in a week [t1], and b is, for instance,
starting a two-year course of study for a higher degree,
[t2]. Looking well into the future, the persons utility
function indicates that b is preferable to a. At this
point, the person discounts the future rather gently.
However, as the time for the vacation comes closer,
the persons utility function indicates a preference for
a over b. Ross (2012) models the various
picoeconomic interests in two ways depending on
whether these interests are conceived as acting synchronously or diachronically. In the rst case, they
may be seen as subagents that have either conicting
utility functions or divergent time preferences. Agents
with conicting utility functions may be modeled in
terms of a Nash equilibrium game among these agents.
Modeling the behavior of subagents whose time preferences diverge adverts to the sub-personal level of
neurophysiology in which a hyperbolic time preference emerges from competition between steeply
exponentially discounting limbic regions and more
patient (less steeply exponentially discounting)
cognitive regions (Ross, 2012, p. 720). This
picoeconomic portrayal depends heavily on the ndings of a key experiment in neuroeconomics based
on functional magnetic resonance imaging scans of
humans choosing between SSR and LLR (McClure
et al., 2004). In the process of scrutinizing immediate
rewards, participants activated brain regions that involve emotion, namely medial orbitofrontal cortex,
medial prefrontal cortex/pregenual cingulate cortex,
and ventral striatum. However, while examining
long-term payoffs, they activated areas of the lateral
prefrontal cortex (implicated in higher cognitive functioning), and part of the parietal cortex related to
Copyright 2015 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.

quantitative reasoning. In his modeling of

picoeconomic conict in terms of diachronically
appearing multiple selves, Ross (2012) speculates
briey about the cognitive demands of such a portrayal: each subagent is portrayed as temporarily in
control of the persons behavior, with its own utility
function and incomplete knowledge of the other, although its utility is constrained by the investments
made by earlier-appearing agent(s).
Papers
The idea that the more rational and more irrational aspects of human decision-making are respectively
governed by separate but functionally integrated brain
regions has a considerable history. However, in the
competing neuro-behavioral decision systems model
(Bickel et al., 2007; Bickel and Yi, 2008; Jarmolowicz
et al., 2013), the view that behavior results from the
interaction of two competing neural systems has
recently become highly developed. This work
incorporates both operant behavioral economics and
neuroeconomics, and is especially relevant for its
applicability to health issues. The competing neurobehavioral decision systems hypothesis identies the
mainsprings of suboptimal behavior as the exaggeration of the reinforcing effects of the consequences of
behavior and an inordinately strong desire for immediate satisfaction. In behavioral economics terms, these
are described in terms of the elasticity of demand for
the reinforcer (following from its excessive valuation)
and the discounting of future rewards over present
consumption (reecting impulsivity). The link between
the two is found in the neurophysiological effects of
the reinforcer on behavior. In The behavioral and
neuroeconomics of reinforcer pathologies: Implications for managerial and health decision making,
David Jarmolowicz, Derek Reed, Florence DiGennaro
Reed, and Warren Bickel argue that while behaviors
that embody reinforcer pathologies are inconsistent
with rational choice theory, they are consistent with
behavioral economics of demand and discounting.
Hence, they note that people who suffer from reinforcer pathologies make particular choices between
commodities they consume and social behaviors
where the latter result in less intense or delayed
gratication.
The study of experimental matching and foraging
in the context of consumption owes much to the
pioneering work of Hantula (e.g., Smith and Hantula,
2003; Hantula and Bryant, 2005; Hantula et al.,
2008). Matching is the predicted outcome when the
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G. R. FOXALL

behavioral options produce qualitatively equivalent

returns. A reduction in the rate of responding on
one schedule when another is adjusted to provide
less demanding payoffs in terms of the number of
responses required for each reinforcement (or more
generous payoffs for similar response rates) is
known as behavioral contrast. In their paper
Matching and behavioral contrast in a two-option
repeated investment simulation, Donald Hantula
and Charles Crowell describe a series of investment
simulations in which matching eventuated when
markets provided equivalent returns but, as expected,
when one market no longer provided returns, behavioral contrast resulted. A third simulation, in which
the returns were again made equivalent, restored
matching, but a fourth phase, in which the conditions that predict contrast were again enacted, restored behavioral contrast in a less robust fashion.
This work extends previous research, conrming that
adults exhibit behavioral contrast and that options are
valued relatively rather than absolutely. This research
is directly relevant to nancial management and, in
particular, investment decision-making.
Roma, Hursh, and Hadja in Hypothetical purchase
task questionnaires for behavioral economic assessments of value and motivation, present evidence for
the efcacy of questionnaire methods in testing the
Exponential Model of Demand, which was discussed
in Hursh and Romas expository paper. This paper
presents an interesting step in operant behavioral economics in that it tests the possibility that self-report
questionnaires specically, the hypothetical purchase task (HPT) questionnaires developed by Jacobs
and Bickel (1999) yield data on buyers
purchase/consumption intentions for commodities offered at various prices. The method is impressive in
view of the difculties inherent in many questionnaire
techniques of obtaining reliable estimates of demand
from consumers responses to hypothetical scenarios
(e.g., Foxall, 2005). The results indicate that HPT
questionnaires provide a valid and reliable means of
estimating demand that is consistent with the results
of more conventional applications of the Exponential
Model of Demand based on data for actual consumer
behavior. Moreover, the HPT approach goes beyond
previous methods of consumer research such as
Gabors (1988) buy-response analysis that established
only whether consumers would be willing to buy at all
at specied prices without enquiring how much they
would buy at each price. The methodological developments presented in this paper provide an enhanced basis for market research, as well as academic inquiry.
Copyright 2015 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.

Asle Fagerstrom, Dag Aksnes, and Erik Arntzen, in

An experimental study of intertemporal choices: The
case of customer relationship management, explore
intertemporal choice in the context of managers having
to prioritize short-term and long-term projects in the
context of customer relationship management. The results indicate a tendency to work on smaller problems
with more immediate payoffs rather than larger tasks
with more delayed outcomes. The ndings suggest a
framework for understanding better the role of temporal discounting in managerial situations, and the implications of technological drift. Asle Fagerstrom,
Georghita Ghinea, and Lars Sydnes, in How does
probability impact consumers choice? The case of online reviews, investigate the role of probability
discounting in consumers evaluations of online
reviews. Participants were offered two choices of shipping scenario: one in which positive customer reviews
were available but prices were higher and the other in
which there were no reviews but prices were lower.
The authors employed a titration procedure to determine the point at which consumers switched from
one buying choice to the other in order to assess the implications of online reviews for intentions to buy. The
shopping microworlds employed in the study were
programmed using MediaLab, which is proving a
sound means of investigating consumer choice in
experimental situations (Fagerstrom et al., 2009).

CONSUMER BEHAVIOR ANALYSIS

Background
Interest in applying operant behavioral economics to
understand better the behavior of consumers and
marketers has led to the development of consumer
behavior analysis. At the heart of this approach is the
behavioral perspective model (BPM), an elaboration
of the three-term contingency that renders it appropriate for the investigation and interpretation of
consumer behavior in complex marketing systems
(Foxall, 1990/2004, 2010). As Figure 1 shows, the
model portrays consumer behavior as the outcome of
two kinds of reinforcing consequence: utilitarian reinforcement consists in the functional benets of acquiring, owning, and consuming products and services,
while informational reinforcement consists in the social benets of these activities. Consumer behavior is
also subject to utilitarian and informational punishment: all consumer behavior is, after all, simultaneously reinforced, by the utilities provided by goods
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OPERANT BEHAVIORAL ECONOMICS

Figure 1. Summative behavioral perspective model.

and their consumption, and punished, by the surrender

of purchasing power and the incapacity to purchase
other commodities (Alhadeff, 1982).
The essence of the model is the consumer situation,
which comprises the interaction of the stimuli that
compose the current consumer behavior setting (discriminative stimuli and motivating operations) and
the consumers learning history, the behaviors she
has previously enacted and their utilitarian and informational consequences. Of particular explanatory signicance is the consumer situation consumer behavior
link: consumer behavior is a function of the consumer
situation, where the consumer situation is the interaction of a learning history and a consumer behavior setting. Moreover, at the initiation of any particular
instance of consumer behavior, the only relevant behavioral consequences (reinforcement and punishment) are those that have occurred in the past when
similar behaviors were enacted within similar situations. The consumer behavior setting comprises the
discriminative stimuli and motivating operations that
form the physical and social milieux of an act of purchase or consumption.
Papers
The remaining papers are concerned with examining
propositions derived from the BPM. That by Valdimar
Sigurdsson, Hinrik Hinriksson, and Vishnu Menon,
Operant behavioral economics for E-mail marketing:
An experiment based on the Behavioral Perspective
Model testing the effectiveness of motivating operation, utilitarian and informational reinforcement, describes the model and examines the explanatory value
of some of its key components in the context of e-mail
marketing. Motivating operations are another kind of
pre-behavioral stimulus, additional to discriminative
stimuli: a motivating operation is an element of the environment that enhances the relationship between a
Copyright 2015 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.

response and its reinforcing consequences (Michael,

1993). Motivating operations have been discussed in
the literature of behavior analysis and consumer choice
by Fagerstrom, (Fagerstrom, 2010; Fagerstrom et al.
(2010)) and Fagerstrom et al. (2011)). The paper by
Sigurdsson, Hinrik, and Menon incorporates motivating operations along with utilitarian and informational
reinforcement in an examination of the suitability of
the BPM as a guide to managerial decision making in
the sphere of email marketing. (For further background
to this work, see Sigurdsson et al., 2013a, 2013b). The
implication of their work is that the effectiveness of
email marketing is a function of managerial activity
with respect to motivating operations and utilitarian
reinforcement.
Vishnu Menon and Valdimar Sigurdsson (Conjoint analysis for social media marketing experimentation: Choice, utility estimates, and preference
ranking) note that there is a close afnity between
the individual level of analysis favored by behavior
analysis, and the individualized marketing strategies
and tactics that personal communication makes
available via social media. The authors argue that
personalized marketing interventions can be tailored
as a result of the analyses that behavioral economics,
allied with conjoint analysis, provides. Their investigation is particularly interesting in the context of the
BPM, insofar as it discusses the nature of price as it
enters into both utilitarian and informational sources
of reinforcement.
Research in consumer behavior analysis, which has
employed Hurshs approach to the determination of
demand elasticity as essential value (Hursh and
Silberberg, 2008; Hursh & Roma, 2015), has shown
that the inclusion of utilitarian and informational reinforcement as independent variables in the exponential
demand model increases the explained variance for
consumption behavior (Oliveira-Castro et al., 2011;
Yan, Foxall & Doyle, 2012a, 2012b). The possibility
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G. R. FOXALL

that consumers maximize some combination of

utilitarian and informational reinforcement, which is
an implicit assumption of the BPM, was tested by
Jorge Oliveira-Castro, Paulo Cavalcanti, and Gordon
Foxall (What consumers maximize: Brand choice as
a function of utilitarian and informational reinforcement) by means of a CobbDouglas utility function.
Data from a consumer panel were used for this
purpose and demonstrate that consumers indeed
maximize bundles of utilitarian and informational
reinforcement. The results indicate a high degree of
intertemporal consistency for each of the four product
categories investigated. This consistency in the proportions of utilitarian and informational reinforcement
for brands within product categories is of managerial
practicality because it can be used to accommodate
the functional and social benets required by consumers to new brands in the course of their development, and to retail operations. The methodology
employed also allows the total amount of utility obtained per consumer to be estimated. Insofar as the total utility obtained was shown to be specic to each
product, the opportunity arises for marketers to take
consumers preferences more closely into consideration at all stages of product development, introduction, and post-launch marketing.

CONCLUDING COMMENTS
In embracing microeconomics, operant psychology
has conrmed the relevance of neoclassical analysis
to the comprehension of complex behavior in experimental and natural settings. Behavioral economics
is often a banner beneath which orthodox economic
theory is criticized on the basis that it is inconsistent
with this or that of psychological or sociological
approach. Operant behavioral economics, somewhat
by contrast but not uncritically, demonstrates the relevance and usefulness of microeconomic theory to our
understanding of behavioral choice that has already
been well-researched from a particular psychological
perspective. At a time when the economics and psychology movement is capturing the imaginations of
scholars from both disciplines, the exploration of operant behavioral economics is particularly apposite. I am
deeply grateful to the authors and reviewers who have
contributed to a collection of papers on operant behavioral economics which, I trust, will be of value to both
behavior analysts and managerial economists.
Copyright 2015 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.

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