Isn't the similarity close between the sporadic pat-
tern that set fire under the pigeon and the tactics Bill
used to control his girl? Bill used intermittent rein-
forcement like a master. He did it by treating this girl
like a queen, his five-minute kiss being one example.
Then at other times, he hit her and gave her no rein-
forcement. So she never knew whether she could
have Bill or not.
This pattern of sporadic reinforcement kept her
acting like the pigeon. She was figuratively pecking
madly at the bar, desperate for any reinforcement
that Bill might give her.
My date never knew exactly where she stood with
Bill. Since she didn't know whether she could have
this man or not, taking him for granted proved ut-
terly impossible. This led her to want desperately what
she felt she could not have. And exploiting this natural
desire on her part gave Bill his puppetlike control
over her. In this human quirk lies a shoving, bone-
deep urge of human nature:
People want what they cannot have.
From this desire come many of humanity's great
foibles. This trait causes people to want material pos-
sessions they can't afford. It leads men to burn them-
selves out pursuing women they cannot have, and it
drives women to self-destruct over men they chase
fruitlessly. Any person who can harness this law of
human nature for his own purposes can wield an awesome influence over other people. As Bill no doubt realized, intermittent reinforce-
ment is the best tool for exploiting people's desire for
things they can't have. When you use this tactic, you
make the other person think that you're the thing he
can't have. Or your business deal is the one he can't
have. He can never take you for granted, because you
alternate between the caress and the bite, between
treating him well and treating him badly. He senses
that he can't have you, and his instincts make him
want you, sometimes almost desperately.
This vulnerability to intermittent reinforcement
explains my date's situation, which looks ridiculous
on the surface-a beautiful girl scrambling after a
man who beat her, when she could have her pick of
men.
Of course Bill had probably never heard of the
pigeon experiment. And I doubt that the term "inter-
mittent reinforcement" would have meant any more
to him than "amortizing his ishial tuborosities."
Rather, I assume that his technique emerged from
years of trial-and-error in his love life. That's how
most people learn it. If you asked Bill how this tactic
works, he would likely reply, "Well, I treat women
real nice most of the time. But if you want to control
them, you've got to be mean sometimes to keep 'em
on their toes."
Before I go any further, I want to insert here that I
don't condone beating women-never having hit an
ad ult in my entire life. Certainly there are many
other ways to withdraw reinforcement. Also, considering the inroads the women's movement has
made, I believe such a neo-Nazi tactic would prove
counterproductive today.
Since I act only as a reporter, debating the moral-
ity of intermittent reinforcement lies outside the
boundaries of my calling. I only report what works,
not what is moral or immoral.
Finally, don't assume that just because this case
dealt with a woman falling victim to intermittent re-
inforcement, that only men can use it. In fact, I've
watched many more males fall for women who are
using this tactic than vice versa.
Intermittent reinforcement applies to your love life.
If you survey your past love life a moment, you
probably can recall instances where you've been
taken in by intermittent reinforcement yourself.
Surely at some time in your life, there has been a cer-
tain person you just couldn't get over. You felt a
magnetic attraction to him or her that bordered on
addiction.
Sometimes he or she charmed you into walking on
air, but at other times you were maddeningly ignored
or treated coolly. Possessed, you jumped between the
highest highs and the lowest lows, feeling the whole
time the awkward sensation of never knowing where
you stood. You couldn't shake her, or get off the
emotional roller coaster.
I'm sure you've endured this kind of tiger's-back
love affair before. I know several women have af-
fected me this way. These women were practicing intermittent reinforcement on me on purpose or by
accident. I was so attracted to them that my human
nature bulldozed my common sense. And I did ev-
erything in my power to please them.
Notice that "1 did everything in my power to
please them." This statement describes what you can
siphon out of a person by using intermittent rein-
forcement the right way.
Specific tactics in intermittent reinforcement
To apply intermittent reinforcement, you follow
two clear-cut steps that take advantage of the fact that
human beings want what they can't have. First, you
set up a pattern of reinforcement by giving your ma-
nipulatee something he wants. Second, withdraw it,
and watch the person come under your control as he
struggles to have the reinforcement restored.
This technique sounds simple. And it is easy to
understand, but it's hard to carry out. It's difficult to
make it work, because you have to first be able to re-
inforce the person you want to manipulate. (That is,
you must provide something he wants.)
You give this reinforcement by charming the per-
son, paying him money, or furnishing him something
else he wants badly. But unless you can give your
manipulatee something he really wants, he won't care
a whit if you withdraw his "reinforcement" by acting
coolly toward him, refusing to pay him, or whatever.
In fact, you probably don't even reinforce most of
the people you know, so trying intermittent rein-
forcement on these persons would be a waste. The people you can manipulate with this technique are
therefore limited to those you reinforce. But by con-
centrating your efforts on these people, you can al-
most lead them like children.
At least seventy to ninety percent of the time you
have to be good to the person you plan to manipu-
late, and give him something he wants. You may do
this by whatever method you choose.
In choosing the correct reinforcement, you'll need
to figure out what would thrill this person the most.
Try to put yourself in his place, and ask yourself
what would boost your manipulatee's ego. What does
he really like? In a business situation you may select
praise, money, or some other reward.
Assuming you have completed step one, you
should be giving the subject of your manipulation
what he wants. But don't get carried away with the
reinforcement. The first thing you know, your ma-
nipulatee will take you for granted, and then you
won't be able to wrench the time of day out of him.
Keep him on his toes. The moment you detect the
slightest hint that your "pigeon" is taking you for
granted, withdraw his reinforcement on the spot.
When you feel taken for granted, you know that you
provided what he wanted too constantly, and that the
time has long since passed to withdraw it.
Applications in your love life
To illustrate, let's apply intermittent reinforcement
to your love life. Assume that over a period of several
days you're trying to charm a woman, and acting asfriendly as possible toward her. She seems to be re-
sponding well to your overtures. But sometimes you
feel like she pays less than rapt attention to what you
say.
Immediately you know the time has come to back
off, and be a little cool and uninterested. Ignore her
for a while. But don't act like a hurt child, and look
foolish in the process. Instead indicate through your
behavior that you can more or less take her or leave
her. If possible, subtly make her jealous by talking to
other women in front of her.
Remember, people want what they can't have.
Now she may begin to doubt that she can have you.
Your independence and confidence are attractive.
You're saying in effect, "I want you, but I can always
have other women if you're not interested. Take it or
leave it." Now she doesn't know exactly where she
stands with you. If you charmed her to begin with (if
you reinforced her), you can bet that she'll be chasing
you in no time. Her human nature will surge, and
she'll begin to want what she can't have-you. Inter-
mi ttent reinforcement has put her under your control
to some extent. Soon you should have her working
madly for the kind of reinforcement she has come to . enJoy.
After you withdraw the reinforcement, usually
wait for her to make the next move toward you. If
she doesn't come after you, then you probably
weren't reinforcing her to begin with. (Or she's
pathologically shy, which is highly unlikely.) Better
concentrate on someone else and come back to her