What's Negative Reinforcement?

Negative reinforcement took me forever to figure out. I always got the questions wrong in my college psychology class. I think it really took me learning about anxiety disorders in kids to understand what is going on. I will try to state the same thing a few ways:

A behavior is rewarded when something bad does not happen because you do the behavior.

The avoidance of a potentially negative outcome rewards a behavior.

You imagine something bad is going to happen, so you design your life to avoid that thing happening.

Basic Examples:

If you have crowd anxiety, your hermit lifestyle keeps you out of nervous situations, thus reinforcing your hermit behavior.

If you have a fear of flying, you avoid buying plane tickets, and you never have a panic attack on a plane.

If you hate to be judged in the checkout aisle, you immediately buy your kid something he wants to keep him from whining in front of other customers, thus avoiding a scene.

Avoidance behavior is the major problem for people with anxiety.

The key to reducing your anxiety is to stop avoiding things. Get out and do the very things that are going to make you nervous. That's right, you have to get nervous to improve your nervousness. You have to practice your weakness until it's no longer a weakness.