Behaviourist Approach

• Classical learning=learning by association
• By repeatedly pairing two stimuli together, we can produce a new learned response in a person or animal. (Classical conditioning)
• Limitation of the behaviourist approach

  • Much of their research was carried out on animals
  • Skinner used evidence from rats to demonstrate operant conditioning
  • Animals and humans have different genetic makeup, we are arguably more complex
  • Difficult to apply behaviourist conclusions to more complicated animals such as humans. This approach has poor generalisability
• What's an advantage of the behaviourist approach?

  Has real-life applications

  • Operant conditioning can be used in schools to encourage desirable behaviours e.g doing hwk, parents getting a child to act in a desirable way
  • Principles of conditioning have been applied to a wide range of real-world behaviours & problems, research is valid
• What's another advantage of the behaviourist approach?

  Has scientific credibility

  • Behaviourist perspective has emphasised on objective and scientific ways of studying behaviour e.g using lab experiments
  • Advantage as experimenter has higher control over extraneous variables so cause and effect can be established.