Behavioural explanation of phobias

• What are the 2 explanations for phobias found by Mowrer (1960)?

  -acquisition through classical conditioning

  -maintenance through operant conditioning
• How did Watson and Rayner (1920) induce a pphobia of rats in little Albert?

  They played a loud noise (UCS) whenever the rat (NS) was presented. This originally produced fear (UCR) due to the noise but eventually the fear became associated with the rat. The rat is now a learned phobic stimulus while fear is a conditioned response.
• How did Mowrer explain maintaining a phobia?

  Through negative reinforcement, people avoid unpleasant situations. This the reduces the fear which continues to increase the avoidant behaviour.
• What did Mowrer (1960) call this explanation?

  the two-process model