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Academic Learning

I learned that the token system is highly effective in motivating participants to take part in our activities, especially when the autonomy to choose their desired prizes is given to them. Exchanging tokens for a positive reinforcer strengthens a particular behaviour by following that behaviour with a desired stimulus (Morrison, 2007). People have subjective perceptions in terms of how much something means to them. For instance, the same item is valued

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differently in the eyes of the various beholders. Through observation, I realize that people tend to exchange the tokens for something (i) they like, (ii) have never seen, (iii) or tried before. First, the 'fastest-selling' item was the nerds because it is generally well-liked by people. Second, I had two foreigner participants who picked the National Council on Problem Gambling (NCPG) water bottles because it was their first time seeing water bottles that are rectangular and flat. Third, I had visitors commenting that they had not try the matcha flavoured hello panda and hence chose it. Therefore, every individual has different motivating factors in their choice of prizes. Although the token economy proved to be successful in garnering participation, it could have been more effective if participants knew exactly how many tokens could be exchanged for how many prizes, contrary to what we executed which was to simply mention ‘you can exchange the tokens for prizes at the end of the activity’. Perhaps, we could have come up with a big board listing the token reward system for a bigger picture of the benefits of participation, boosting passers’-by motivation to take part.

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1 token awarded for every  correctly answered question
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Tokens can be exchanged  for prizes!

Advocacy is imparting knowledge about something you know to someone else so as to improve his quality of life (Royea & Appl, 2009). Prior to the roadshow, I thought people would find learning about Problem Gambling (PG) useless because it was not relatable to majority of the students. Similar to what I would do, I thought passers-by would avoid roadshows because they would feel it was a waste of time. Initially, I also felt a tinge of embarrassment for people to participate in our activities because I thought it was ‘lame’ for people my age to play ‘snake and ladders’. However, to my bewilderment, the visitor count at my booth exceeded my expectations and I realised that people were actually engaged in our activities. Most of our participants were our Psychology Studies (PCS) seniors, lecturers, foreigners, and students from other schools. I realise these groups of people were much more receptive to participate than other from Ngee Ann Polytechnic (NP) students in general. This could be due the rapport between PCS seniors and lecturers, as well as foreigners or students from other schools being more responsive in an unfamiliar environment (Leung, Koh, & Tam, 2015). It was heartening to see many people learning about PG and engaged in our roadshow, in contrast to my prior beliefs of how the implementation would be. Although advocacy is not my cup of tea because I fear the rejection of being turned down, I still feel it is necessary and not entirely useless. Indeed, advocacy is not easy as it requires a lot of endurance and one must not be easily intimidated by rejection. However, even if there is just one person who might be helped or impacted after 50 rejections, the hard work laboured is worthwhile because it value-adds to someone’s life, fulfilling the aim of advocacy.

Word count: 567 words 
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References 

Leung, A. K., Koh, K., & Tam K. P. (2015). Being environmentally responsible. Journal of Environmental Psychology,                       43(1), 79-94. Retrieved from https://ink.library.smu.edu.sg/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?article=3273&context=soss_                    research

 

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Morrison, A. (2007). The relative effects of positive reinforcement, response-cost, and a combination procedure on                 task performance with variable task difficulty. The Huron University College Journal of Learning and                                     Motivation, 45(1), 197-223. Retrieved from https://ir.lib.uwo.ca/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?article=1053&context=

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Royyea, A. J., & Appl, D. J. (2009). Every voice matters. Early Childhood Education Journal, 37(2), 89-91. Retrieved from                  https://link.springer.com/article/10.1007/s10643-009-0335-y

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