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We examined the effects of conditioned reinforcement on children’s choice between re-liable (100%) and unreliable (50%) reinforcement under various stimulus conditions in a concurrent-chains procedure. The study was conducted across three experiments. Ex-periments 1 and 2 were conducted under conditions similar to basic laboratory work and consisted of participants selecting from one of two black boxes (placed on a table) that were correlated with different reinforcement schedules. In Experiment 3, we assessed a participant’s preference for unreliable reinforcement during conditions in which the target responses were aggression and mands. Results of the three experiments showed that the participants preferred unreliable reinforcement under certain conditions. Findings are discussed regarding the role of specific stimuli (i.e., items correlated with a reinforcement schedule, adult reactions) as conditioned reinforcers and how they may influence chil-dren’s preference for a response (e.g., aggression, self-injury) that produces reinforcement on a leaner schedule than a socially desirable response (e.g., mands). DESCRIPTORS: conditioned reinforcement, unreliable reinforcement, choice, delay to reinforcement A problem frequently faced by clinicians occurs when individuals with developmental disabilities show a preference for problem behavior that produces a leaner schedule of reinforcement (i.e., unreliable reinforce-ment) than does a trained, socially desirable response, such as mands (i.e., reliable rein-forcement). Previous applied research has shown that variables such as reinforcement schedules, response effort, immediacy of re-inforcement, and quality of reinforcement We thank Phil Hineline and Tim Vollmer for their helpful comments on an earlier draft of this manu-script. These experiments were conducted while the authors were at the University of Pennsylvania. Requests for reprints can be addressed to Joseph S