The premack principle, response deprivation, and establishing operations

This paper describes response deprivation as an establishing operation. In this context, we review the concept of establishing operation, in particula r, its reinforcer-establishing and evocative effects; we place response dep rivation in the literature on the reinforcing effects of behavioral activit y, wherein response deprivation subsumes the Premack principle; we describe the reinforcer-altering and evocative effects of response deprivation; and we address a methodological concern about the evocative effect. In closing , we discuss some conceptual and empirical implications of the foregoing an alyses.