Behaviourist approach

• Assumptions

  all behaviours are learnt

  ignores mental processes, measures observable behaviour

  rejects introspection as its too vague

  uses lab experiments to maintain and control objectivity
• classical conditioning - Pavlov

  learning through association

  he conditioned dogs to salivate to sound of a bell

  food - ucs salivation - ucr

  the food is repeatedly paired with bell, this produces salivation because of food

  dog learns to associate food with bell, so salivates to bell. the dog has been conditioned
• operant conditioning - skinner

  learning through consequence

  reinforcement - increases likelihood of a behaviour happening

  positive - reward for good behaviour

  negative - behaving in a way to avoid something bad

  punishment - reduces likelihood of a behaviour happening

  positive- given something bad

  negative- something good taken away
• the Skinner box experiment

  rat was placed in box

  box had leaver to dispense food

  the rat learned to press the leaver to receive food, the rat was positively reinforced

  rat was placed in electrocuting box

  pressing leaver stopped electrocution

  rat learned to press leaver to stop electrocution the rat was negatively reinforced
• a strength of the behaviourist approach is it is based on well controlled research

  focused on the measurement of observable behaviour in highly controlled lab setting

  By breaking down behaviour into a stimulus and response units, all of the extraneous variables are removed and establishes cause-and-effect

  however, learning process may have been over simplified. they have ignored important mental processes like thought
• a strength is the real world application

  principles of conditioning have been applied to everyday behaviours

  token economy , rewarding behaviours with tokens that can be exchanged for privilege. positive reinforcement

  this increases the value as there is widespread application
• a negative is environmental determinism

  see all behaviour as conditioned by past experiences

  skinner suggested everything we do is based off reinforcement history

  ignores the influence of free will on behaviour
• A limitation is animal research

  Issues of ethical issues and assumer humans learn the exact same with animals, so it’s difficult to generalise