BEHAVIOURIST APPROACH

• BEHAVIOURIST 


   focuses on behaviourism that can be observed and measured for example, a stimulus and response. It ignores the mental processes of the mind, and so it is highly scientific in its methods ie.
• BEHAVIOURIST 


  DARWING explains how human learning is just a more complex learning of animal learning as they learn from experience
• BEHAVIOURIST 


  that behaviour can be explained through conditioning. The behaviourist approach is split into two classical conditioning and operant conditioning.
• CLASSICAL CONDITIONING 


   idea of learning by association and so learning occurs when 2 stimuli are paired together.
• CLASSICAL CONDITIONING - PAVLOV

  investigating how conditioned reflex responses can be created in dogs. He managed to condition dogs to salivate when they heard a bell. At first when the dogs were presented with the food they salivated. The food was the unconditioned stimulus and the salivation was the unconditioned response. He then introduced a neutral stimulus which was the bell. Eventually the dogs salivated when no food was given and just the bell was sounded. The bell was then the conditioned stimulus and the salivation was the conditioned response. 
• OPERANT CONDITIONING 


   behaviour is shaped and maintained by its consequences.
• OPERANT CONDITIONING 


  If there is positive reinforcement for a behaviour such as a reward is it likely to be repeated.
• OPERANT CONDITIONING 


  negative reinforcement which occurs when an action stops something unpleasant from happening
• OPERANT CONDITIONING 


    If there is punishment the behaviour won’t be repeated.
• OPERANT CONDITIONING - SKINNER

   experimented on Rats to show the influence of positive and negative reinforcement. The rat soon learnt that pushing the lever would result in food and would go straight there once put in. In another box a rat was placed and was subjected to a current. There was a lever which when pressed would stop the current. Once the rat hit the lever once it quickly learnt to go to the lever to stop the current. He concluded that rats can learn behaviour through operant conditioning.
• (+) BEHAVIOURIST - LITTLE ALBERT

  WATSON + RAYNER =

  ound that Albert could develop a phobia of white traits through associations and classical conditioning by pairing the rat ( NS) with a loud bang(UCS), creating fear (CR). This suggests that [phobias can be learnt as a direct result of environmental experiences, rather than having a biological predisposition. 
• (+) BEHAVIOURIST - SCIENTIFIC CREDIBILITY

  It is based on well controlled research and behaviourists focused on the measurement of observable behaviour within highly controlled lab settings. All extraneous variables were removed allowing cause-and-effect relationships to be established. This suggests that behaviourist experiments have high credibility.
• (+) BEHAVIOURIST - reductionist approach 


  it may oversimplify the learning process. Other approaches, such as the social learning theory and the cognitive approach have drawn attention to the mental processes involved in learning. For example, SLT using imitation of others influencing yours. This suggests that learning is more complex than observational behaviour alone and that private mental processes are essential. 
• (-) BEHAVIOURIST 


  Many critics have questioned the ethics of conducting investigations such as the skinner box. The animals were exposed to stressful and aversive conditions, which may have affected how they reacted. This shows that there is a lack of ecological validity (animals will behave differently in their natural environments).