Using the experience sampling method in the context of contingency management for substance abuse treatment.

Contingency management (CM) treatments have been shown to be effective in reducing substance use. This manuscript illustrates how the experience sampling method (ESM) can depict behavior and behavior change and can be used to explore CM treatment mechanisms. ESM characterizes idiosyncratic patterns of behavior and offers the potential to determine how behavioral patterns are affected by the operant conditioning principles that drive CM. It may also lead to the identification of new target behaviors for CM in the context of substance abuse treatment.