‘Apply behav assumps to explain 1 human behav’ (10)

• Para 1: humans are born like a blank slate

  One behaviourist assumption is that all behaviour is learned through interactions with the environment, not inherited biologically. According to the idea that we are born as a ‘blank slate’, individuals develop behaviours purely through experiences. for example, a person might develop a fear of dogs if they were bitten or scared by one as a child. This early experience becomes an environmental stimulus that influences their future reactions. This shows how the fear is not innate but shaped by environmental exposure, supporting the behaviourist view that nurture plays a greater role than nature in behaviour development.
• Para 2: behaviour learned through conditioning

  Another key assumption is that behaviour is learned through classical conditioning - a process of forming associations. In this case, the dog (originally a neutral stimulus) is paired with a frightening event like being bitten (unconditioned stimulus), which naturally produces fear (unconditioned response). After repeated pairings, the dog alone becomes a conditioned stimulus that produces fear (conditioned response), even in the absence of threat. This demonstrates how classical conditioning can explain the development of phobias like cynophobia through learned associations.
• Para 3: humans and animals learn in similar ways

  Finally, the behaviourist assumption humans and animals learn in similar ways allows researchers to generalise findings from animal studies to humans. Pavlov’s classical conditioning with dogs showed how neutral stimuli could become associated with responses like salivation, and this principle has been extended to human behaviours such as fear responses. Similarly, therapies like systematic desensitisation use the same learning principles to help people unlearn phobias by replacing fear with relaxation. This supports the assumption that studying animal behaviour provides valuable insight into human psychological problems and how to treat them using behaviourist techniques.