Another general class of establishing operations involves acquiring some object which would allow the organism to make a subsequent response that would be reinforced. If Cameron says that they will give you $100 for a sketch of a cat, the reinforcement value of a pencil (and the likelihood that you will ask for one) will probably increase sharply.
An environmental change or event with the following features:
Precedes the response to which it is functionally related
Increases the effectiveness of a particular stimulus change as reinforcement
The type of environmental event
The cause of the environmental event
The type of stimulus that gains reinforcing effectiveness