Behaviourist approch

• Behaviourist approach: only concerned with studying behaviour that can be observed and measured - its not concerned with mental processes of the mind - introspection was rejected by behaviourists as its concepts were vague and difficult to measure
• behaviourist approach - controlled lab studies: tried to maintain more control and objectivity within their research and relied on lab studies to achieve this
• behaviourists - use of non-human animals: they suggest the process that govern learning are the same in all species so animals can replace humans as experimental subjects
• classical conditioning (Pavolvs research) - learning by association:

  before conditioning: unconditioned stimulus = unconditioned response

  no stimulus = no response

  during conditioning: neutral stimulus and unconditioned stimulus paried

  after conditioning: conditioned stimulus = conditioned response
• Pavlovs research (classical conditioning): conditioning dogs to salivate when a bell rings:

  before conditioning: UCS=food/ UCR=salivation/ NS=bell

  during conditioning: bell and food occur at the same time

  after conditioning: CS=bell/ CR=salivation
• operant conditioning: refers to learning as an active process whereby humans and animals operate on their environment - behaviour is shaped and maintained by its consequences
• Operant conditioning (Skinners research) - rats and pigeons in specially designed cages (Skinner boxes)

  When a rat activated a lever, it was rewarded with food pellet

  A desirable consequence led to behaviour being repeated

  If pressing an animal avoided an electric shock will be repeated
• 3 types of behaviour (operant conditioning)

  • positive reinforcement: receiving reward when behaviour is performed (increases likelihood of behaviour repeating)
  • negative reinforcement: avoiding something unpleasant when behaviour is performed (increases likelihood of behaviour repeating)
  • punishment: unpleasant consequence is performed (decreases likelihood of behaviour repeating)
• strength: behaviourism it uses well-controlled research - the approach has focused on the careful measurement of observable behaviour within controlled lab settings - behaviourists have broken behaviour down into stimulus - response units and studied causal relationships - this suggests that behaviourist experiments have scientific credibility
• counter-argument of behaviourism using well controlled research: however, this approach my oversimplify learning and ignore important influences on behaviour (thoughts). other approaches (social learning theory and cognitive) incorporate mental processes - this suggests learning is more complex than what we can observe
• one strength is behaviourist laws of learning have real-world application: principles of conditioning have been applied to a broad range of real-world behaviours and problems. token economy systems reward inappropriate behaviour w/ tokens that are exchanged for privileges (operant conditioning) - successfully used in prisons and psychiatric wards - this increases value of the behaviourist approach because it has widespread application
• one limitation is behaviourism is a form of environmental determinism - the approach sees all behaviour as determined by past experiences that have been conditioned and ignores any influence that free will may have on behaviour - Skinner suggested that free will was an illusion, our past conditioning determines our outcome - this is an extreme position and ignores influence of conscious decision making processes on behaviour (as suggested by the cognitive approach)