Operant conditioning

• What did Skinner suggest?


  That learning is an active process whereby humans and animals operate on their environment. In operant conditioning there are different types of consequences to behaviour
• Consequences of behaviour Positive reinforcement - 


  Receiving reward when a certain behaviour is performed
• Consequences of behaviour Negative reinforcement - 


  Animal or human avoids something unpleasant
• Consequences of behaviour Punishment - 


  Unpleasant consequence. Punishment decreases likelihood of behaviour being repeated
• Consequences of behaviour positive + negative- 


  Positive and negative reinforcement increases likelihood of behaviour being repeated
• Skinners research - 


  -He believed that the best way to understand behaviour is to look at the causes of an action and its consequences. He called this approach operant conditioning

  -Behaviour which is reinforced tends to be repeated (strengthened) behaviour which is not reinforced tends to die out or be extinguished (weakened)

  -Skinner studied operant conditioning by conducting experiments using animals which he placed in a 'Skinner box'
• Continuous reinforcement- 


  An animal/human is positively reinforced every time a specific behaviour occurs e.g every time a lever is pressed a pellet is delivered and then food delivery is shut off

  -Response rate is slow

  -Extinction rate is fast
• Fixed ratio reinforcement- 


  Behaviour is reinforced only after the behaviour occurs a specified number of times. E.G 1 reinforcement is given after every so many correct responses, after every 5th response

  -Response rate is fast

  -Extinction rate is medium
• Variable ration reinforcement - 


  Behaviour is reinforced after an unpredictable number of times. For example, gambling

  -Response rate is fast

  -Extinction rate is slow (very hard to extinguish because of unpredictability)
• Weakness animal behaviour -

  Many of the experiments that behaviourists have conducted were conducted on animals and it can be argued that animal behaviour is not comparable to that of humans. Barnett argues that the use of animal research in explaining human behaviour is outdated and oversimplified as humans are cognitively, biologically, socially different to other humans. Operant conditioning research has contributed little to our understanding of human behaviour
• Positive practical applications-

  -Practical applications and its principles have been used to treat schizophrenic individuals.

  -Alloy found that when the token economy was used that patients showed more socially desirable behaviours. This demonstrates how rewards can shape behaviour.

  -However, these treatments tend to only be effective as long as rewards are given and do not lead to a long term change in behaviour patterns as Skinner suggested
• Weakness Bandura- 


  -Argued that 'if actions were determined solely by external rewards and punishments, people would behave like weathervanes, constantly shifting their behaviour'.

  -In fact, we often pursue our long term goals rather than being influenced by immediate situation

  -Therefore, operant conditioning is an overly simplistic explanation in explaining human behaviour
• Criticism Free will- 


  -Skinner famously described free will as 'an illusion' and argued that all behaviour is a result of conditioning.

  -Our experience of choice is merely the sum total of reinforcement contingencies that have acted upon us throughout our lives

  -This approach is hard determinism and it states humans have no free will. Other approaches such as humanistic approach suggests that this is not the case
• Strength scientific method- 


  -His research is reliant on scientific methods

  -His use of laboratory experiments was highly controlled, objective, systematic and replicable

  -This allowed him to establish a causal relationship. This means that his research lends strength to his theory